


Blind Addiction

by Elizabeth1985



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Apparently I needed some kink, Blindfolds, Blow Jobs, Butt Plugs, Cockwarming, Dean craves Cas, Dean has addictions, Dean is on a downward spiral here, Dean needs to feel Cas' skin, Edging, Gags, Grace-Powered Orgasms, M/M, Nice!Demons, Oral Sex, Original Character(s), Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Restraints, Rimming, S12 canon divergence, drug use (pot), grace!kink, moderate dom/sub tones
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-14
Updated: 2018-09-02
Packaged: 2018-10-05 01:12:00
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 26
Words: 67,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10294025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elizabeth1985/pseuds/Elizabeth1985
Summary: Dean's no stranger to addictions, and with the return of his mother—who continually disappoints him, he's been falling back on the familiar crutches of alcohol and nameless sex. However, there's one urge he's denied himself, has kept buried deep within his soul. But under the strain of current circumstances, he can feel it needling away inside him. It's only a matter of time before he caves, before he reaches out in a moment of weakness for an angel who's supposed to be his best friend. Why does he have to crave the one thing he knows is sure to destroy him?  Maybe if he just... closes his eyes. Maybe then, his deplorable descent won't be quite so terrifying.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I only meant to write angst and porn. I only meant to write _one_ chapter. *Accidentally writes 12 chapters in a week* OOPS. 
> 
> Anyway, I'm not entirely sure where this is going to be honest, but I have several chapters written and I will be posting one a week, probably on Wednesdays, to give myself time to continue writing ahead of the posting schedule.
> 
> Thanks to [Tennyo](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Tennyo/pseuds/Tennyo/works) for being my wonderful beta as always.

 

_The moth don't care when he sees the flame._

_He might get burned, but he's in the game._

_And once he's in, he can't go back, he'll_

_Beat his wings 'til he burns them black..._

_-Aimee Mann_

* * *

 

It was time to fuel the addiction. One of them, anyway.

There was nothing shameful about it, everyone had some kind of vice. If they said they didn’t, they were dumb and had a limited understanding of what it meant to need something. Sure, for some people it was booze, or drugs—or on a good day, both. You know, the usual suspects.

But there were people who pretended they were above it, thinking that because they weren’t governed by the low-life dependencies of drugs and alcohol they were immune to the rule of an addiction.

_Yeah, don’t think so there peeps_ , thought Dean. Like this hoity-toity lady, with her white scarf and fancy heels and her judgy eyeballs. Snubbing her stupid nose at the terribly handsome man buying Jim Bean in bulk on a Wednesday morning.

_Yeah, well, fuck you too lady._

Dean Winchester—self-taught addiction expert—knew better, despite his lack of a gilded education. He saw those Lululemon-wearing yoga moms with their daily Starbucks' and hard-ons for celebrity gossip. He’s been to the occasional Hatha class, he knows alright. The men don’t get a pass neither. All those forty-somethings walking around in cheap pressed slacks, short-sleeve business shirts that screamed ‘ _I’ve given up’_ , and Dean knew they went home and played house until they had thirty minutes alone to beat it off in front of the soft, detached glow of a laptop screen. 

So yeah, for Dean it was a smorgasbord of traditional. Some whiskey, anime porn, penchant for a good brawl, your daily dose of high-octane coffee, and his plethora of addictions was nice and well-rounded. ‘Course, he never tried to fight the urges. It would’ve went against his impulsive and gluttonous nature, a trait he happened to be rather fond of in himself.

Besides, he _liked_ it. All of it. Every drink he’d ever taken had been a relief, every one-night stand a welcome break from his shit life. Why would he fight it? Why would he censor his own actions when half the time they were the only thing holding his shit together.

That’s all addiction was, your own personal crutch. Who cared if it was drugs or gossip, a need was filled and that was that.

It’s not the he was proud or anything. He just didn’t care. And honestly, who could blame him? He was rounding his way towards forty, had spent his entire damn life fighting monsters. _Yeah, you heard that right._ Goddamn monsters: Vamps, werewolves, demons, etc. You name it, he and his bro have ganked it.

_I mean, fuck, who does that?_

Anyway, all that said, Dean figured he was entitled to a few not-so-healthy addictions; prisons of his own construction and whatnot. Not that he ever expected to let any of them get out of hand. There were a few times over the years his drinking had nearly become an issue. How could it not have? When the people you loved were dropping like flies, what other alternative was there? Put on a brave face and pray to Jesus? No fucking thanks, pal.

Despite the paper bags full of booze in his arms, and the grumpy countenance he was sporting on the way out of the store, you would think Dean was seriously down in the dumps. Truth was, he’d just got his mom back from the dead, so things weren’t all that shittacular as per the norm—at least that was the party line.

It wasn’t every day he and his brother Sam witnessed a resurrection, and that’s saying a lot considering their past.

You see, the Winchesters, among a slew of others, lived a few shades outside of reality. They were raised knowing the truth, knowing about all the things that went bump in the night. Dean’s first memory of this well-kept secret happened when he was four.

_The scream woke him. He heard the crackle of fire a second later. Finding his bleary way into his little brothers room, he was met by a wall of dry heat and the horror in his dad’s eyes. “Take your brother outside! Now Dean—GO!” A six month old Sammy was plunked in his arms and he couldn’t think, all his energy fixated on trying not to stare at the flames wrapped around his mother’s body… on the ceiling as it was. Because her death wasn’t quite horrific enough, a demon made sure of that. Sam stirred in his arms, his father yelled. As Dean backed out of the room, he couldn’t escape the smell of burnt flesh. Sharp and acrid. It followed him like a sickness down the stairs. He tried to cover Sam’s face with the flannel baby blanket, but there wasn’t enough slack. They made it to the front lawn, and he watched in confused horror, as dancing fingers of orange and yellow curled out of the windows and snaked up to the roof. No one was screaming anymore. Whatever childhood he might’ve had, it was lost—just like that._

Shaking his head of the past, Dean stared down at the driver’s window of the black 67’ Impala—the last real memorabilia he had left of his father. In the crisp reflection of the window, he saw in himself pieces of his father. The short, light-brown hair, stern set eyes, and stiff jaw; a ruggedly handsome facade covering a dark interior. Dean wondered for a moment, what things would be like if he’d gotten his father back instead of his mother. It wasn’t something he wanted, but a deep-seated part of him craved the man’s approval—dead or alive.

He rubbed the tension from his face and unlocked the door. Time to take his life-assist bottles back to the bunker they called home.

On the short drive back, he couldn’t help thinking of the judgy woman at the liquor store, no doubt buying her fancy red wine for a pompous dinner that night. It was a joke, how far removed he was from the rest of the world. Mrs. Snoot-snoot would be popping a cork tonight, maybe to celebrate an anniversary. All Dean would be popping would be some serious wood while he scoured the internet for its abundance of depraved porn. Yaaaaay.

But that wasn’t all, he reminded himself. There was a job at hand, never a dull moment in this life. On deck this season was the goddamn anti-christ shitstorm they were barreling towards. Couple months back Lucifer had gone and knocked up the President's right-hand woman.

God, you couldn’t make this shit up.

You see, _you see,_ this was exactly why he needed to drink. Yoo-hoo just doesn’t cut out when you’re dealing with demon spawn.

Hmm, Dean wondered if the devil’s bouncing bundle of joy would emerge into the world demonic and murdery, or if the baby would be innocent and one day crave things like Yoo-hoo and pencil crayons.

Dean honestly wasn’t sure what outcome he’d prefer.

Whatever, he was steering down the sloped driveway and his brain shut off the current line of thinking to wonder about what kind of reception he was going to get. He’d been extra surly lately, shouting at Sam not three hours ago for something he couldn't even remember.

Snatching the brown paper bags, he exited the car and walked through the garage to the main bowels of the underground base—a relic from the old days when there was a legit organization in place to counter the evil in the world. _The Men of Letters_ , they’d called themselves. Fuckers had gone and abandoned America, boosting up their presence elsewhere in the world only to ride in on white horses not too long ago and demand hunters of the US “do better”.

Needless to say, Dean had given them a big heaping fuck you.

Man, Dean’s life was batshit crazy. Oh, how he would _love_ to trade in the ready-made addictions of hunter life and become a Starbucks-guzzling soccer mom. At least in that scenario he could wear women’s skanky underwear and not feel like a freak. Goddamn Rhonda Hurley, getting his kinks going way back in his teenage years. And why were panties so fucking silky? How could anyone _not_ love that?

“Dean?”

Snapping his head up, he saw his brother standing in the hallway—curious. At six-foot-four, Sam was a dominant presence between the walls. And he wasn’t lanky-tall, he was a beat-down-ready-to-be-dished-out tall.

“Still in bitch mode?” Dean wondered.

The flare in Sam’s nostrils gave him the yes he expected, but Sam spoke anyway. “What the hell is the matter with you, Dean? We get mom back… and you’re… you’re drinking”—he gestured to the brown bags Dean was holding like babies—”at ten-thirty in the morning.”

Dean smirked. “Technically, I haven’t started drinking yet… and about mom, you say we have her back? Huh.” Making a show of looking around, Dean called out, “Mom? You around somewhere?” He then pinned Sam with a look and said, “Oh, that’s right, she ditched us.”

Sam pursed his lips, eyes darting away in frustration. He had nothing and Dean knew it.  Ducking past his brother, he detoured to his room and shut the door. He cursed, immediately regretting the confrontation. It wasn’t his plan to piss his brother off.

He simply didn’t understand Sam’s complacency. Dean figured if _he’d_ been tragically ripped away from his kids and then dropped back into their lives he wouldn’t leave their damn sight ever again.

Mary Winchester apparently didn’t feel the same. Thirty-plus years of separation weren’t enough in her books. No, she had to pack her stuff up and go off on her own. Excellent, mom. Mother of the year.

Alright, so maybe things weren’t as good on the surface as he chocked it up to be. Maybe that was why one particular urge was rearing its head lately. Dean glanced at one of the bottles now sitting on his nightstand, but reminded himself drinking wasn’t the urge he was dwelling on.

No, it was something else entirely. The only selfish desire he’d ever shut out. He managed it so well sometimes he barely knew it was there. It wasn’t yet an addiction. Fear overrode his addictive nature on the subject, but that barrier was getting lax.

Dean could handle the drinking, the sex with strangers, the appetite of a future diabetic. But there were two things he steered clear of. Ecstasy, because that shit was _too_ good… and, as it happened to be the case: An Angel.

That’s right fellas. _Angel_. As in wings, powers, descendent of God. No halo, though, as he’d been corrected once before.

The problem was that avoiding drugs was way the hell easier than avoiding your best friend. God, it was almost cliche: Falling in love with his best friend? Ridiculous! Although, thinking over the past, it was more as if he became best friends with the man he’d fallen in love with. Whichever came first didn’t really matter in the end. It was all a mess in his head anyway.

He didn’t want to think of the name, that was descent step one. But it clawed through his skull, a buried creature yearning to be free.

_Castiel._ Cas… Angel of Thursday. Savior of one Dean Winchester. Badass motherfucker and quirky reluctant hunter ally.

Ugh. “Shut up!” Dean smacked the heel of his palm against his forehead. But he couldn’t think of anything else now.

Cas had saved Dean and his brother countless times over the years, he’d even betrayed his own kind for them. Or, as pointedly stated once: For Dean and Dean alone. They were bonded in ways Dean would never understand and it complicated everything, confusing him until he was sure a tumor was growing behind his eye sockets. Cas wasn’t like anyone else Dean had ever known, human or otherwise. He was blunt, oblivious, intelligent, caring, occasionally ridiculous and always captivating. Showing up with his out-of-control dark brown hair and sharp blue eyes, it was hard to think when the guy had a sightline on ya.

As Dean’s frustration and disappointment over his mother’s behaviour nagged at him, his buried need for Cas surged forward. Same as it did in Purgatory, same as it did during every other wave of dire circumstance. In the same way he craved a steady jetstream of alcohol, he craved Cas.

It wasn’t anything more complicated than needing skin-on-skin. Sure, all the pleasantries lovers shared would be nice, but Dean had always been more of a somatic based guy. But with one often came the other, and he knew he’d never be able to separate the two.

Sex would evolve to a connection he’d never be able to break and in doing that, he’d be screwed. Giving in to the need, his love of this one person, was kept at bay _only_ by the strength of his fear.

A fear that wasn’t fabricated from nothing but built high over the years of reinforced truth. The truth that every single person he loved died. Maybe they came back, as Sam had before, and now his mother.

But maybe they wouldn’t; like his dad, Jo, Ellen, Bobby, several others. Fuck, Cas had already died a bunch of times already, and sure he’d come back, but the odds of that trend continuing were pretty fucking slim.

How the hell could Dean go on living, fighting the good fight, if he tangled himself with Cas only to watch the angel be torn from his life for good. No thanks. He’d rather jab a a billion toothpicks into his own scrotum. At least by keeping his distance, he could hold onto a fantasy, meet Cas’ eyes in a rare silent exchange, know he was there.

Besides, Dean could be fucking lethal when he wanted and if he suffered the angel’s death after being given a taste of him, he’d probably destroy the world trying to get him back. No one wanted that.

But that was the thing about addictions, wasn’t it? Sometimes they didn’t give you a choice, sometimes your fear—however thick it was—wasn’t enough to counter the need. The worse he felt, the more he needed. It was only a question of when he caved, and how far he’d fall.

Dean unscrewed the cap of the bottle, hearing the familiar crack in the seal. He swallowed a mouthful, foregoing a glass. It stung all the way down. He hoped this addiction would drown out the other one.

If it didn’t? Hmm, maybe he could duck and roll so to speak. When the craving rose over him, when he called out for what he wanted, maybe he could restrain himself. Tweak the collision to limit the damage. He’d be an asshole, for sure. There wasn’t a doubt about that one. But protecting Cas was more important than saying ‘I love you’.

Love didn’t matter when everyone was dead.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not a very big chapter, but we're just building things up here :)... I tried to add more in but I'm crazy tired today and I just can't write very well right now. If I can, I'll post the next chapter earlier next week. And FYI, my beta was busy so this chapter hasn't been proofed, just msg me or sthg if I've made any glaring errors. Thanks guys and love you lots <3

“Answer your phone!” he shouted, glaring at the screen. Dean’s mother didn’t pick up. The ringing faded away and a standardized voicemail came on. He cursed and ended the call, not giving a shit if all his mother heard after the beep was an F-bomb.

He felt Sam’s bitch-face coming at him from the right. He could picture the clenched jaw, the judge-loaded glaring. _Jesus, kid._ He waited a beat, Sam would cut the silence sooner or later.

“She needs time.”

Dean had to roll his eyes. “Seriously?” Turning to face the passenger seat, he shot his brother a tiresome look.

“Yes, Dean. Seriously. Imagine if you—”

“—If I what,” he cut the giant Winchester off, “If I miraculously came back to life and could see my _kids_ again. Yeah, you know what I wouldn’t do?! I wouldn’t pull a Reese Witherspoon and cut and run, I can tell you that.”

“You don’t know that. Besides, that’s not what this is.”

He snorted indignantly. “That’s exactly what this is. Mom may be one hell of a hunter, but as a mom, you know... she kinda sucks.”

“God, you can be such a dick sometimes.”

Oh, and the little brother throws a hard one. “Guess it runs in the family.” He didn’t bother to hide the bitter edge in his tone.

Maybe Dean _was_ being too hard on her, maybe he needed to be a little more understanding, but you know what, he was the kid here—the kid that had to grow up with the memory of a woman who smelled like fabric softener and vanilla perfume and would cut the crusts off his sandwiches, tuck him in at night and tell him she loved him always. The same kid who then witnessed her horrific death, would remember the smell of it for the rest of his life.

If Dean ever had kids—not that he would—but if he did, he wouldn’t be selfish with them. Come hell or highwater, he would always put their needs first. He’d be there, no matter what. He would know when they needed him, and fucking _be_ there.

“Dean?”

Right. He nodded to his brother, but his mind was churning. They needed to leave for the morgue, the case they were on was growing complicated as they usually did, but he held off on turning the engine over to ask his brother a straight-up question. “How are you not mad? At all? I mean, you don’t even remember her… and now, she’s just, she’s robbing you of even more memories. And you don’t even care.”

Sam’s eyes narrowed, thoughts turning over behind his expression. “Because I love her no matter what, and because no one’s perfect. Dean…” His brother paused, looking away as if he debated whether to continue. “You being pissed at her… for keeping distance because she can’t handle it right now is pretty damn hypocritical.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

With tension in his jaw, Sam turned and stared at him; words apparently unnecessary to convey the message.

“Don’t stare me down,” Dean snapped, “fucking tell me. How am I being hypocritical.”

“You want me to say it,” Sam challenged, surprised etched in the curve of his mouth. All Dean did was raise his eyebrows and wait for the blow. “Fine. You’re harping on mom and yet, for _years_ , you’ve kept Cas at arms reach because you can’t handle anything else.”

“That is not the same and you know it,” he fired back.

His brother frowned. “Right. Of course.”

It wasn’t an agreement, it was barely a soft end to the argument. Dean put the key into action and got the car going, doing his damndest not to feel the need growing.

 _Cas…_  

The name sat there, idle in the back of his mind. It wasn’t alone, it rested alongside a smattering of thoughts, fantasies, abstract images of what was possible. All of it, taunting him to a breaking point.

***

By the time they cleared the picturesque valley town of tricky ghouls, Dean was walking the edge of his addiction. Four days had passed since his brotherly spat with Sam and still no sign of Mary Winchester.

Twice, in the last eight hours alone, Dean had hovered his finger over Cas’ contact in his phone. He told himself he was calling to touch base, to see if Cas had dredged up any leads on the devil-baby. But he worried the angel would hear the desperation in his voice, the clawing need to be touched. The urge came at him with a strength he hadn’t felt since Cas had returned from Purgatory. He’d almost given in back then, _almost_.

It was why, when Naomi— _the biggest bitch in the garrison—_ had taken over Cas and used him to attack Dean, nearly taking him out for good, it had hurt beyond belief. The incident had fucked up their relationship well enough to shove his urges to a distant dark corner of his soul.

Sitting on the edge of the motel bed, while Sam was off gassing up and carbing up for the road, Dean rubbed his mouth against his knuckles, counting the stray bits of carpet between his feet that stood out amongst the rest. His hand detoured to the back of his neck, massaging out the stiffness leftover from sleeping on a subpar mattress.

He felt the angel’s name inside him, twisting through his thoughts, weighing heavy at the centre of his chest. He knew what it felt like to take Cas’ hand—a memory jaded by violent circumstance, but nevertheless, he knew. Remembered being surprised by how soft his hands were, knowing with firsthand experience how jarring the guy’s right hook was. Being an angel meant he could take your head off in one swing if he had a mind to.

Dangerous hands, but perfect and soft too. Very dextrous.

Dean’s foot started to bounce, he closed his eyes and shook his head. After a few seconds of the jitters he got up and crossed the room. On the table by the door there was your standard issue motel stationary. Dean scribbled out a note to his brother and left.

The town was a few thousand residents shy of a being a city. It had only a few bar options, he chose the place he knew Sam wouldn’t come looking for him—at least not at first. It was flashy, surprisingly hopping for a town like this. He wanted to be the guy that fell into the background, that no one noticed so he could either drink or find a willing party with some degree of anonymity.

Two and some hours later, he was quietly easing himself out of a stranger’s bed. The sex had been exactly what all one-offs were like: hard, fast, and strangely unsatisfying. With his feet on the floor, he looked back, trying to remember a name. His mind gave him nothing except the name of someone he was trying to forget.

His one-nighter stirred. _Shit_ , he waited too long.

“You’re taking off?”

Dean looked at the man lying comfortably behind him. He nodded, not quite able to feel bad about ducking out. “I had fun though.”

The guy smiled, a few years younger than Dean. He looked like the type of man Dean would’ve been careless with when he was in his early twenties and still thought hunting was fun and that his dad was a damn hero.

“Me too,” the stranger said. “I’d give you my number but I have a feeling we won’t be saying each other again.”

God, wasn’t that the definition of Dean’s life. A rollcall of people he never saw again. Dean forced a cocky grin and lifted the sheet, raking his eyes over the naked body he let show him a good time. “Right-click, copy, annnnd saved.”

As he hoped, the man laughed. They were quiet as Dean dressed and tugged his boots on. He didn’t offer a kiss goodbye, and wasn’t asked for one.

“Thanks,” he said sincerely before he left.

Dean’s one night stand was sitting up, showcasing the broad chest of an athlete. Dean wondered what his game was, tried to remember if he’d asked.

“Take care of yourself.”

Dean squinted. It was an odd send off for someone you just fucked. Whatever, he left and caught a cab back to the motel. He didn’t try to sneak his way in, Sam had known by the note where Dean would’ve gone. Despite his griping on the issue, Sam always preferred he make a racket when he got in, so Sam would know he was safe.

Monsters try to kill them on a weekly basis, but somehow Sam still worried about Dean climbing into bed with strangers, as if he couldn’t handle himself.

What Dean sure as hell didn’t expect when he walked in, was to find Cas sitting in the corner of the room shrouded in darkness.

His first thought was whether Cas knew where he’d been, wondered whether he cared. Okay, that was a cheap shot. Dean knew Cas cared, he knew the same way he knew Castiel would give him whatever the hell he wanted if only he had the balls to ask for it.

“What are you doing here?” Dean glanced at the empty bed nearest to him. “And where’s Sam?”

“We have a lead on Ms. Kline. Sam left to track down your mother, asked me to wait here… until you returned.”

“Wouldn’t have to track her down if she’d stuck around,” he mumbled to himself, not paying attention as Cas got up and came towards him.

“Where were you?”

Dean let his stare rest somewhere to the side of Cas’ head, avoiding his blue eyes. “Doing groceries,” he fired off sarcastically.

He saw the annoyance flit across Cas’ features, but the angel said nothing. “I have my car, let’s go. We’re meeting Sam and your mother in Chicago.”

Awesome. Not only would he be stuck in a car with Cas for x amount of hours, but they were heading to a town full of monsters and the weather was always shitty there. “Why the hell is she in Chicago?”

Cas shot him a dumb look. “How am I supposed to know.”

“Where’d the lead come from?”

“Another angel.”

Huh. Wasn’t like Cas to go to the other angels for help. Most of them despised him. “Who?”

“Micah.”

“Do you trust him?”

Cas chewed at his lower lip. “Yes.”

“Alright then, let’s hit the road.”

As Dean started to back his way to the door, Cas held up a hand. “I can wait, you know. If you need to eat, or use the washroom… or shower.”

God, it was awkward with Cas sometimes. He nodded without a word and picked up his bag Sam had left by the door and secluded himself in the dimly lit bathroom. Twenty minutes was all he needed and they were on the road by the time the sun rose over the horizon.

It was rare Dean sat passenger in a car that wasn’t his. Cas’ car wasn’t as nice as the Impala obviously, but it smelled like the angel. A scent Dean had never been able to figure out. Something intangible but reminiscent of warmth and comfort. Not exactly spicy, but dark in a comparable way.

Dean dragged his thumb along the curve beneath his lip, falling into a strange trance as he watched Cas drive in silence. He was tired, feeling the long night in his thighs. The car shot past a line of trees that had been shadowing the road, and all at once a wide fan of sunlight fell onto the windshield, masking Cas’ features in a bright glow. He didn’t squint against it, why would he? When the angel himself was practically made up of sunshine.

Dean almost couldn’t keep his eyes open, he longed for his sunglasses but they’d be in the Impala Sam had stolen. Dean wondered if Sam had driven off on purpose to leave him alone with Cas. It wouldn’t have been the first time his baby brother had tried to work a scheme in regards to Dean’s love life.

There was about two feet between them, he and Cas that is. Maybe less. He pictured himself reaching over and sinking his fingers into Cas’ hair, grabbing his head and pulling him over. They’d crash probably. But who cared? He imagined the feel of Cas’ mouth on his, those hands yanking off Dean’s jeans, the sharp stare boring into his.

Fuck, there was something about those eyes. Deep blue usually, but if he was close enough he saw the splinter of white, like sunlight filtering a lake.

Dean shifted in his seat, closing his eyes to the sun. He did his best not to think too hard, or too loud. He wasn’t all that clear on how Cas’ angel powers worked.

“Sam tells me you’re mad at your mother.”

Does he now? Dean shook his head. “I’m not _mad_ ,” he corrected, “I’m…” _upset, disappointed, pissed the fuck off._ “Okay, I’m not _not_ mad.”

Cas threw him a look before his eyes went back to the road. “No one is perfect, Dean. Not even parents. You know that as well as I do.”

He sighed, hating how easy it was to let Cas talk him down. “Would you leave your kids like that?”

Cas pressed his lips together. “I don’t know, I don’t have any.”

“Oh come on, Cas. I know you wouldn’t. And so do you.”

“Your mom is an amazing woman, but everyone has their own struggles, Dean. And she knows that your father raised you to be strong and I expect she believes you will be fine on your own.”

“Of course I’m fine on my own. I’m not a damn toddler,” he shot back. “That’s not what this is about. It’s about sticking together, it’s about being given the gift of a damn lifetime and throwing it to the curb.”

The air in the car was feeling thick, and Dean saw Cas regrip the steering wheel. “Maybe for once you should be thankful for what you have, appreciating whatever time you get with her instead of ruining it by being upset with her.”

He didn’t know what to say. He hated the rational spin Cas had taken. It played into Dean’s fear of losing the ones he loved, and by that reasoning, needing to hold on to whatever relationship he had with them—however imperfect it was. As he thought more about it, he found himself staring at Cas, staring in a way Cas was sure to notice.

The angel’s blue eyes didn’t deviate from the centreline. Whatever individual thoughts they were having, it raised the temperature in the front seat.

Cas knew, and Dean knew. Hell, the goddamn steering wheel probably knew. Whatever they had between them, it was one hell of a road trip way past friendship.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, I didn't have time to get this beta'd but I didn't want to miss posting when I said I would. Sorry for any errors :)
> 
> Warning tags for very brief discussion of rape (but refers to demons and nothing specific, nor described by any means) but I just wanted to make sure to point it out.

Dean scratched his head for the fourth time. He wasn’t even itchy, he just needed to fidget. That was what addicts did, right? Claw their own eyes out to avoid taking a hit.

“Dean, sweetie, are you okay?”

He looked across the table at his mother. Cas’ words in the car on the way up still echoed in his mind. Yes, he was mad, but the idea of having her permanently yanked out of his life one day made him make the most of whatever time he had with her.

Still, it was hard to keep the bitter edge from his voice. “Peachy.”

Knowing him as well as she did, despite her absences, she squinted at him but served up her growing look of concern towards Sam and Cas. Smart move; they were definitely more likely to ramble than he was.

Sam nervously adjusted his posture. “Dean’s, um… just, ya know, having a rough week.” Hating to lie as he did, Sam cleared his throat—as if the muscular exercise erased the fib.

Going along with peculiar family moment, Dean forced a smile and they all carried on. After a long brunch, Sam, Cas, and Dean headed out to meet up with the angel Micah, while Mary went off to make inquiries with local women’s clinics in the area.

By default, Dean tended to hate anything with wings. Angels, pigeons… didn’t matter. Cas was the only exception. Micah was definitely on the hate-list. Not only was he a condescending prick, but he had the face of a goddamn model and the body of a porn star. It wasn’t as if Cas noticed, or cared. But Dean still hated the fact that the two were friends. Especially seeing as the last time Cas met up with “friends” he nearly got himself killed.

Dean cut through the current niceties. “You wanna just tell us where the pregnant lady is?”

To his right, Sam huffed at the lack of Dean’s diplomacy. Cas, however, barely restrained a smirk.

Micah stared down at Dean, looking at him as if he were no more impeding than a crack in the sidewalk. “Do you always approach delicate matters with such… abrasion?”

He snorted. _I’ll show you abrasion, you fucking—_

“Dean is simply concerned, as we all are,” mentioned Cas.

“Yes. Devil spawn is certainly a concern.” Micah’s dark grey eyes scanned the parking lot they were having their meeting in, it was clear he wasn’t checking out the collection of sedans and minivans. “She’s here.”

“In Chicago?” Dean and Sam asked together.

Micah hardly acknowledged them. “Yes, here in Chicago. She’s seeking protection from a very old order of demons who have… defected, as it were.”

Defected? “What the hell does that mean?” What was it about angels that made them skirt the point so damn hard. Instead of replying to Dean, Micah sought Cas’ attention, the two of them sharing a silent thought. Wasn’t that barf-inducing. “One of you guys want to clue me in or are we just gonna stand here all goddamn night?”

Sam straightened his stance. “Dean has a point. Cas, what’s he talking about?”

In a familiar expression, Cas pressed his lips together as he geared himself up to speak. He paced a few steps away and doubled back. “Long ago, very long ago in fact. There used to be a sect of demons whose sole purpose was to… proliferate.”

“As in…”

Cas met Dean’s astonished gaze head-on. “As in that, yes.”

Both he and his brother cringed. “But they had defected, you said,” Dean gestured to the other angel, “meaning they, uh, stopped spreading the seed and what not, right?”

Micah dipped his chin. “Yes, that is correct. But only because there was so few of them and… one by one, they succumbed to a demon’s greatest peril.”

Sam was the one to ask: “Which is what?”

Cas and Micah shared a look. Castiel responded, his weirds oddly weighted, “Falling in love. Or so that’s the story.”

It was a solid minute before Dean was able to say anything. “So some really old rapey demons, who traded hell for wedding bells are now helping protect the devil’s baby mama?”

“Yes.”

“S’all you had to say,” Dean told them. “Okay then. Where do we find this treasure trove of crazy?”

Cas rolled his eyes. “I do _not_ recommend we show up guns blazing, Dean.”

“Hate to break it to you, buddy, but there’s really no other plan here. Time’s ticking by and we have no idea what happens when that thing comes screaming into the world.”

Sam shifted on his feet, reluctant to agree but did so nonetheless. “It’s not the best option, obviously. But Cas, we really can’t take chances here.”

Rage brimmed in Cas’ eyes, his cheeks blooming red. “Listen, both of you—this poor woman did not ask for this and we have no idea what this child will be like. Are neither of you even going to take a moment to consider the implications of murdering a mother and child?”

Someone had to do it, and it might as well have been Dean. “We didn’t say anything about her,” he clarified, “Lucifer’s offspring, however, is another story. Look Cas, I get it. You’re dealing with what Ishim did, and you have regrets—anyone would, but this is different, man.”

Cas was rarely harsh with Dean, but those blue eyes were damn icy when they settled on his. “I should correct myself. I was not asking you”—his sharp gaze shot to Sam and then back to Dean—”I am telling you: We are not doing this today.”

Micah interjected, “I have to agree with Castiel. As much as I believe eliminating the unborn child is what needs to be done, the demons protecting the mother are vicious and cruel if provoked. I think it best we avoid their wrath.”

“Whatever. We won’t go after them but you need to tell us where they are.”

“There’s a house, in Old Town.” He handed Dean a slip of paper holding the address. “But no engaging until we have more information.”

The brothers nodded grudgingly and parted ways with Micah. Great, they were in a fucking holding pattern. Not exactly what he needed here.

Dean bee-lined for his car, feeling Cas’ presence surround him all over again now that the matter at hand was shifted to the back burner. It was clear, from the too-straight posture of Sam’s walk and his faint cough that he could feel the tension between them as if they were all surrounded by the over-dramatic melodies of a soap opera music.

It didn’t help any to see Cas all revved up and pissed off. All that did was remind Dean how goddamn dynamite he would be in bed. Yeah, this waiting period was going to suck.

Or, pointedly, not suck… as it was.

***

With four of them on the hunt, it had been necessary to ask for two hotel rooms. Since Mary and Cas knew each other the least, and because Sam had a fine knack for pissing Dean off, Dean found himself dropping the Impala’s keys on a side-table in the room he would be sharing with the angel he was trying not to think about.

God, didn’t his brother know it was a stupid idea to dangle heroine in front of an addict?! Jes _us_.

Until they had a “gameplan” or whatever-the-fuck, all they could do was bum around like their feet were stuck in concrete. He hated it, hated waiting to act. Such a useless form of annoyance. 

It was the day after they’d met Micah, and Mary was still pursuing the clinics while Sam tracked down prominent gynaecologists. Micah and Cas were off scoping things out. _And Dean?_

Dean was laid back on a motel bed trying to not scream until his lungs blew up. He was pissed at everything lately, and he knew it was useless and stupid, and one hell of a bad mood to be in on a hunt. Especially this kind of hunt.

He decided to remedy that with a recent purchase.

Time faded in and out towards dusk, a wonderful side effect of the weed he’d just smoked in the bathroom. Dean had sworn off pot for years after one bad incident, but the older he got the more he realized he needed to chill the fuck out every once in awhile.

He limbs felt light and heavy at the same time, a gentle buzz ran along the underside of his skin and his brain was wonderfully fuzzy. This was the state he was in when the motel door opened and Cas strode in, his expression displaying his lack of progress on the case at hand.

The angel took one look at Dean and concern rose in his gaze. “You’re high.”

Ah, perceptive as always that angel. “Yup.”

“Do you really think that’s wise?”

Dean snorted. “You told me to wait. You told me not to go in guns blazing. This is me waiting, deal with it.”

Shoving aside the discussion, Cas sat down on the far bed and flopped back. It pinged an ridiculous flare of emotion inside Dean to know they were lying in sync, their eyes seeing the same ugly popcorn ceiling, counting the same cracks.

“Find anything out today?”

“We saw five of them, the demons. There may be more, but we’re not sure. Either way it doens’t tell us much of anything.”

Dean closed his eyes. “I really don’t like you getting so close. It’s dangerous.”

“Says the man who wanted to show up yesterday with a trunkful of weapons likely useless against our enemy.”

What a snarky little angel. Dean felt a smile pull at the corner of his mouth. “To be fair, we don’t _know_ they’re useless.”

“They aren’t typical demons, it’s possible they are as indestructible as Abaddon was.”

“Hmm. Yeah, that redhead was one tough bitch to gank.”

Cas was silent, though Dean heard the faint movement of his breath. He listened for a long time, wondering if Cas had plans to fall asleep. They should go eat, or meet up with Sam and their mother. They should do something other than lie there in silence together.

It was obvious when the high was wearing off, when anxiety started to needle at him. Dean sat up, turned to see his friend.

The angel’s eyes were closed, his features clear of expression. No lines of worry dented his forehead or between his brows. The rise of his chest was even and Dean envied it. Because it seemed lately, every breath Dean took was accompanied by a dull pain, as if he had a bruised rib—which he didn’t. Not yet anyway, but they were still early in the game on this hunt.

He cleared his throat, and watched Cas’ eyes pop open to meet his. “I’ll get Sam,” said Dean. “We should get some food. Dive into research mode.” Staring back, Cas hummed in acknowledgement but said nothing.

The night wore down with the four of them cramped in Sam and Mary’s room, chowing down on cheap greasy grub while they poured through the respective texts before them. Dean had taken residence of Sam’s bed, with everything spread out around him. Castiel was at the table, and Sam and Mary were comparing notes on the far bed near the bathroom.

It was creeping closer to one a.m. and Dean was having zero luck finding anything useful in the book propped on his knee. The last chapter was nothing but the pontification of some asshole who thought he knew everything but talked in circles and never really said a damn thing worth a dime.

He slammed the book shut, and everyone turned to the abrupt sound. “If I have to read anymore from Dr. Dumbass I’m going to kill something. You guys find anything?”

Sam frowned, while Mary seemed strangely more empowered by their collective lack of progress. His brother spoke up, “Zilch. What about you, Cas?”

Castiel's jaw was tight as he shoved the book away from himself, glancing loosely in their direction. “Nothing. How is it that we’ve never known more about them then we do?” The question, clearly, was not meant for anyone currently the room, but generically directed at the angels.

Agreeing silently the night was a waste, he and Cas said their goodnights and headed down the front walkway towards their joint room.

There were no other motel patrons enjoying the calm night. No one taking a smoke or grabbing a late night pop from the machine. Overhead, the buzzing safety lights lightened the sidewalk. When they reached the pale green door, Dean stopped and turned to the parking lot.

Like the lights above, he was buzzing to. He wanted to take the Impala and find a quick fix in the way of some willing corporate nobody who smelled nice. He felt Cas’ eyes on him, curious of the thoughts he was having.

“Think any bars are open?” asked Dean.

Cas leaned against the wall, hands buried in his pockets. He regarded Dean the same as he did in the early days, when he felt superior. Or that’s how Dean saw it anyway.

“It’s Chicago, I imagine there are some open late into the night.”

Licking his lips, Dean thought about leaving Cas alone in the motel for the sole purpose of finding another set of hands to bend him over and rattle his brain. If he stayed, he’d have to hit the bottle hard just to fall asleep.

Long gone were the days of falling asleep like any other normal human being. Dean needed assistance to get there. It used to be because he needed to forget the nightmares of icky things with teeth, or to delude himself into believing he hadn’t lost every single person he’d ever cared about. Now, he had other reasons. Blue-eyed, trenchcoat wearing reasons. 

He knew his gaze rested longingly on the Impala, the urge to cut and run nagging him. He almost took a step towards it. Almost. But it was late, and he knew deep down his actions had consequences. There were endless ways he had and would probably continue to hurt Cas, much as he tried not to.

This wouldn’t be one of them. Not tonight anyway. He turned his back to the parking lot, meeting Cas’ watchful eyes. He wished he didn’t find them so mesmerizing.

“Might as well save the party time for after we figure out this devil baby stuff, huh?”

Saying nothing, Cas quirked his lip and twisted his hand in an absent motion beside his thigh. The door lock disengaged and the door swung inward, courtesy of Cas’ unreliable powers.

The gaping door, and shadowed motel room within, reminded Dean of a different adventure. A journey to some unknown place with dragons and scaly things to slay. Certainly not a tame two-bed room he was temporarily forced to share with an angel he couldn’t stop thinking about.

They were quiet, but nowhere close to calm. He felt it in the air as he walked inside and unbuttoned his collared shirt. He discarded the shirt, and his pants on the chair by the window and crawled under the blankets.

On the bedside table was a half-empty bottle of Whiskey. Dean reached for it and pulled it into bed with him, trying his best not to watch his friend's actions from the corner of his eye. Despite his efforts, he saw the angel shuck his beige overcoat, but nothing more. Cas laid on the bed on his back, same as he always did. He never slept exactly, not the way humans did. Instead, Cas closed his eyes and simply ducked out of consciousness in a snap.

Damn, wouldn't that be nice.

Dean could only achieve that efficiency from passing out. Something he planned to do soon. Propping himself on the pillows, he uncapped the bottle and gulped down a bracing mouthful of the sharp liquid.

Midway to another sip, he held the open bottle beneath his nose and breathed in the sharp scent. Spicy and strong, the sort of thing you feel in the back of your throat. Dean closed his lips around the ribbed glass and upended the bottle. It burned going down.

Knowing Cas was checked out by now, he let his stare drift to the right. The longing in him was as sharp as the whiskey, pain radiating across his chest. It was strange to think he would give up years of his own life to simply cross the space between them and find warmth by Cas’ side without consequence.

But there were _always_ consequences.

Dean couldn’t be sure how long he stared at his best friend, or when exactly the staring transformed into a dream. In the dream, Cas was all over him—hands tight on his shoulders, lips rough against his own, the taste of him addictive. Everything about Cas enveloped Dean in a dizzying fantasy where physics didn’t have meaning. It was dark and he felt good; this was all he knew.

His skin was damp, breath quick and uneven. A moan breached the confines of the dream, but it wasn’t reality seeping through, it was a nightmare building out of his fear. The darkness of the dream cleared, and Cas’ hands were still on his shoulders but they weren’t just tight… they were clawing at him, _scratching_.

“Cas?” he cried out, his voice distant and weightless.

Castiel didn’t hear him. He was falling, slowly, his pale hands sliding over Dean’s chest leaving smudges of red in their wake. The angel's knees cracked against the stone floor but Dean didn’t hear it. As he glanced down, he realized the dampness covering his skin wasn’t sweat as he thought before, it was blood. Cold and slick.

It was happening. Horror crippled Dean as he watched his life fall apart, a scream of protest held trapped in his lungs but he felt it echoing in every cell. Castiel’s formerly glowing blue eyes turned cloudy, his skin fading from pink to pale white to a very final greyish-blue.

If he could just reach for Cas, hold on to him a little longer… he started to reach down but Cas fell further out of touch. The floor was there but not there, always further and further away. Dean fumbled and fell, trying to get back all that he’d lost. Sorrow closed in around him, suffocating him. He was falling and he couldn’t breathe.

He was falli—

“Fuck!!” Dean flailed awake, the sensation of being weightless still tripping him out. His skin was tacky with sweat, his cotton t-shirt stuck to his back. Wiping the distress from his face, he forced his eyes to clear, to reorganize reality and searched out the clock on the nightstand.

The digital green lights lit up the remnants of the whiskey, a blend of acid green and deep amber. It made the booze look radioactive. Dean nudged it aside and saw it was only half past three.

He groaned, ignoring the way his hands continued to shake. God, he just wanted to feel Cas’ skin… just for a second.

Off-kilter, Dean fumbled to the side of the bed and sank to his knees on the scratchy carpet between the beds.

 _Please don’t wake up_...

Feeling as strung tight as cable wire, he reached out and let his hand graze along Cas’ arm towards his wrist, his fingers tracing bone and smooth skin. Christ, he felt like he was going to explode—the toxic mix of emotion and need ballooned inside him.

Dean bowed his head and let his fingers sink between Cas’ knuckles, threading their hands together. His heart beat erratically behind his ribs, heavy and loud. Sometimes regret and need overshadowed the fear, sometimes he was just too tired to hold back.

Sometimes when you loved someone, it slowly tried to kill you. But that was life, right?   


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, sorry I missed yesterday - super busy at work! Posting two chaps today, but this one is kinda small but it made sense to break it where I did.

It took eight days before they were ready to go after Kelly.

In teams, over the last two days, they carefully constructed the biggest devil’s trap they could manage using dark wire that couldn’t be scratched or easily broken. It encased the entire house and half the neighbourhood. It blended into landscaping and disappeared against brick. Cars drove right over it.

From there, they waited and waited. She would have to leave eventually and once her steps were clear of the wire, they’d grab her. Sam and Dean were on point at the south end of the trap, Cas on the east, Micah on the north, and Mary taking point on the west.

Waiting sucked, but Dean could handle it. Hell, he’d happily live here for days if it meant snatching the devil’s babymama and saving him one more night trapped in a room with Cas. Three nights now he'd gotten out of bed to feel the warmth of Cas' skin. His dreams had gone haywire. With the need crawling through him, his more deviant preferences came out every night when he finally managed to duck below the conscious line. 

Honestly, the fact that Dean managed to hold out this long was a goddamn miracle. To be fair, he’d burned through a quarter ounce of pot during that time but hey—what’s a man to do?

To his left, Sam raised his phone to his mouth, the conference line open to all parties. “Cas, anything?”

“No.”

One by one, Sam checked in with the others. Dean could tell his brother was growing restless. “Relax Sammy, we’ll get her.” Checking his watch, they were zeroing in on lunch time. “Mom seemed pretty sure she’d want medical attention.”

His brother shrugged. “Or they’re bringing it to her.”

“We haven’t seen anyone come or go in hours.”

“Don’t remind me.”

Dean wrapped his arms around the back of the headrest, stretching his chest and closing his eyes. He yawned hard and wished a coffee pot would magically appear in his lap.

Micah’s voice, urgent and thick, cut through the quiet. “I’ve got her, she’s coming this way.”

“Here we go.” Dean started the car and sped through the local streets until he reached Micah’s assigned spot. Both of them jumped out, their running strides falling in line with Cas beside them.

They saw the struggle through unhealthy hedges, flashes of movement. They didn’t waste time going around and pushed their way through thick branches and scratchy foliage. When Dean stepped through to the far side, he saw Micah reaching out towards the woman’s terrified face; his palm lit up like the Fourth of fucking July.

“Don’t!” Cas raced forward, his speed breaking the laws of physics.

“Castiel!” Micah growled in warning. “It _must_ be done.”

As Dean, Sam, and Mary pulled up into third place, Cas was already drawing his blade. The stern set of his jaw told Dean he couldn’t be reasoned with—his own past haunting him. Dean had to make a quick decision and as much as he partially agreed with Micah… he had to be on Cas’ side. The future of his own sanity might very well depend on it.

They all had angel blades out now, each of them catching the sunlight. “Listen,” Dean placed all his attention on the angel who now had his arms roped around a struggling pregnant woman—her expression fierce. “We don’t know if this is the right thing yet. There could be repercussions of killing it, so think about that—”

Kelly struggled, shrieking, “My baby is not an _IT_!”

They collectively ignored her. Micah’s lip curled, his palm rose again—a hot, deadly light pouring from it. 

“Don’t!” Sam and Mary screamed, but Cas and Dean were already flying forward. The two of them crashed against the angel and woman at the same time. As if they’d practiced the maneuver a thousand times, Cas grabbed for Micah while Dean took the woman in his arms and yanked her free of harm’s way.

He wasn’t sure what came over him, but he found himself cradling her in a protective embrace. There were no sense of malice when his skin touched hers. He'd been expecting that, he realized. A sense of wrongness in the same way he felt _off_ when he'd been near Amara. But this was different. All of his well-honed instincts told him that whatever she carried, it wasn’t evil. Dean had no doubt the child would be powerful, maybe even destructive, but evil didn’t exist here.

Sam and their mother hovered above him; he hadn't even registered crashing to the ground. The low sobbing and muttered protests from the woman inside his arms was mostly drowned out by the grunts and blows of Cas and Micah battling it out. Dean cringed every time Cas took a hit, fear closing around his heart. There was a flash of blade, and Dean's heart stopped for a fraction of a second. But Cas was a vicious fighter, sweeping his arm up and slicing a bright line into the other angel's forearm. One blade clattered to the ground but Cas took a blow to the chest.

Watching Castiel stumble backwards, his grip loosened, the blade flying free of his hand—Dean couldn't take it anymore. The angels were too evenly matched in strength and speed.

The fear of losing Cas roared in his veins. Unhealthy and toxic. It was like Dean was a crackhead sitting on the sidelines about to watch his supply get flushed. Fuck that. Just because he _wasn't_ shooting up didn't mean he _wouldn't._ Christ, he was comparing Cas to heroin.

With a sound akin to thunder, Cas took a blow to the face—his entire frame sagging one way and then another. No doubt the demons were probably onto the ruse now and looking for ways to break their trap. Whatever time they had was running low, and so was Cas' stamina.

Dean looked back at his family, pleading, “Fucking hell, guys—help him… both of you. _Now!”_

They traded a hesitant look, knowing what he was asking of them. Not that they haven’t killed angels before, but Micah hadn’t exactly done them wrong. Hell, the angel’s argument had merit, but he still needed to die. Any threat to Cas basically signed your death warrant as far as the Winchester's were concerned. 

Sam called out to Castiel, tossed him the forgotten heavenly sword and they all watched Cas grab it with finesse, twist forward, and drive it straight through the other angel’s chest. Light blasted outward. Dean threw his arm around Kelly’s face, tucking his own against the back of her head.

When the moment settled, and Cas was wiping blood from his blade with a torn expression, they hoped for a moment of calm.

They weren’t afforded that.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I said I would post two chaps before this Wednesday and here I am with the second one finally lol. Will still post another on Wednesday as well. If I've messed up, please let me know. :) :)

“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” The voice, low and smooth, came from the right.

They looked over all at once to see seven behemoth demons. Tall, muscular, and well… gorgeous. Damn, no doubt women had fallen for them. Jesus, Dean was nearly springing up in ways that were very wrong considering the circumstances. “I believe you’ve taken what’s ours,” one of them said.

“Please,” Kelly murmured, though Dean wasn’t sure if she was pleading for the demons to save her from the vicious hunters, or vice versa.

They rose to their feet, but Dean refused to let her go. She didn’t struggle. Cas strode up to the edge of the line, looking far more confident than Dean cared for. Sam, thankfully, was there to back him up.

“She is not yours.”

“Neither is she yours, Angel.”

“You _do_ know what she’s carrying, right?” asked Sam, his hazel eyes looking straight ahead. It was rare for Sam to have an opponent of matching height. Let alone seven.

The one demon hanging back, seeming uninterested, tried to hide a smirk. His voice was strange, not rough or low, but Dean thought if he were to sing it would sound nice. “You Winchesters…” he sighed. “Children.”

 _Excuse me?_ Dean made a face. “Who the fuck are you calling a child here?”

One of the demons gestured to Mary. “You did bring your mother on a hunt against us, that makes you a child, no?”

“Oh, you motherfu—” In one move, Dean had twisted Kelly behind him and pushed her into his mother’s arms. He was closing the distance fast when Cas reached out and snatched his jacket—holding him back like a dog on a leash.

“Don’t.”

Dean felt his lip twitch, his stare challenging the others. “Why don’t you come on over and we’ll settle this then?” Man, he was itching for a fight bad. 

The burliest of the demons stepped forward, eyes flicking down to the thin black line and back to Dean. He stepped over it. _Right over it._

Oh, shit. “Cas!” Blades were drawn for the second time, but before all hell broke loose, Kelly screamed:

“Stop! Everyone stop!”

They all turned to her, as if she had control over each of them, despite her humanity and buck-fifteen status. “What?” asked Dean, all the others stunned into silence.

She looked around at all of them, searching for the right person to direct her words to. They ultimately settled on Cas. She stepped free of Mary’s grasp and walked forward, her arm cradled beneath her barely noticeable bump. An unconsciously protective mother.

Cas lowered his blade as she approached and it made Dean twitchy, but he held his tongue. She placed her free hand on his chest, and cards on the table, Dean’s heart nearly stopped thinking she was about to obliterate him somehow, but nothing happened.

“I’m sorry I left you. But I didn’t know what to do… and all of you,” she looked around at Sam and Dean. “I saw the fear in your eyes, and I knew. I knew you would try to kill my baby.”

“We found her,” one of the demons interrupted. “The moment the life inside of her had been created, we began tracking her.”

She smiled at one of them. A certain kind of smile. “I couldn’t risk the hospital, I would’ve needed ID…” Her face flooded with guilt and a past horror Dean couldn’t understand. She skipped over it. “They found me in a bad place. I’d been told it was an unregulated clinic for women. Cheap, you know. The kind of place they don’t ask questions. It wasn’t what I thought, and things could’ve turned out horrible for me, but he—” she averted her gaze from one of the demons and gestured to all of them, “They saved me. They’ve been doing everything to help me.”

What the hell? Sam’s brows were dented together when he faced the demon horde. “Why?”

A few of them smiled, some turned away. “The child she’s growing won’t be anything of what you’d expect. Not powerful the way any other demon spawn would be. Not even a nephilim,” he said to Cas. “There are legends that stretch back to before we were created, rumours from hell and heaven alike. Have you not heard of them?”

As the question was obviously meant for Cas, the angel narrowed his eyes at the others and thought hard. Dean could only wonder of the history Cas had to catalog through for the right information. Something piqued and he said, “Ozodien de arezodi.” There was a pause and Cas stepped towards the wall of muscle. “A myth.”

“No, angel. Not a myth. This woman holds salvation... For every demon in existence.”

Dean shared a look of dumbfounded shock with his brother. “Okay, here we go again with the cryptic chitchat. Can someone please tell me in english what the fuck is going on here.”

The sly-looking demon, the one who’d been hanging back broke through the ranks and was striding towards Dean head-on. Everyone had a moment of spastic shit-flipping but Dean waved them off, he knew when someone was about to knock him down and this wasn’t it.

“Best if I show you.”

Blackness closed around Dean before he could react. A scene unfolded in his mind, or the demon’s mind, he wasn’t entirely sure. They were somewhere ‘other’. In a place Dean imagined existed only in Hell, yet not a place in Hell he’d seen himself. In the vision, he saw something that didn’t make sense, heard words in a language he didn’t know.

He saw a child, small hands and face so completely out of context in the vision it was hard to reconcile in his mind. Standing grotesquely in front of the kid was a demon on the monster-version of steroids. Overgrown and horrifying, spikes ridged along its skin and teeth pointed and stained red.

It bowed before the child, confusing Dean more. The boy, or girl, Dean wasn’t sure—they reached out and put their palm to the large scaly forehead of the demon. Light erupted in all directions, but Dean managed to see through it. He watched, in sharp silence, as the beast shrank and twisted in formation, claws shrinking to beige hands and human fingers.

It _became_ human.

When the vision ended, Dean was flung back to reality so hard he nearly fell. Likely would have, if the demon hadn’t steadied him.

Man, what a turn of events this was. He looked over into blueish-brown eyes, “You can be human again! That's the kind of power this kid'll be packing?”

There were a few nods from the demons, hope not quite masked in their eyes. 

The statement rattled its way through their own group, Dean heard the sharp inhales of Sam and his mother. Cas was strangely silent, standing on the sidelines. Kelly stood between him and the other demons. Despite being recently hurtled into the dark underworld, she seemed comfortable with the company around her.

The smirky demon nodded to Dean. “Yes. And now you see why we’ve been protecting her.”

“Okay, so we take her to the bunker,” Sam cut in, “it’s the safest place there is.”

One of the other demons shook his head in the negative. “There are forces, as you can imagine, that would do everything to keep that infant from coming into existence. King of Hell included.” He added pointedly. “While the bunker has kept you both safe, there are seven of us, and believe me, our home is more of a fortress than yours.”

Dean snorted. “Don’t know about that. We snagged her in a couple days.”

Mr. Smirky Demon threw Dean a wink. “Maybe we wanted you to, maybe we wanted to bring you into the fold.”

Mary crossed her arms, suspicious. “Why? You need us for something don’t you.”

The demon that seemed to be in charge acknowledged her. “The Men of Letters are trying to snuff us out… it seems they’re aware of our association with Kelly. I wonder who gave them the information,” he shot a look to Dean’s mother.

“Hey, hey there, watch it, big guy. How the hell were we supposed to know you guys were… good or whatever. We were told you all were psychopathic rapey demons.”

In sequence, each of them flashed expressions of outrage and offence. Some growled. Their eyes turned red. If Dean doubted their sinister origins, he didn’t that moment. “Relax, relax. We were obviously misinformed.”

“Yes, you were,” one of them snarled through his teeth.

Ever the rational one, Sam said, “Okay look, we all want to keep her and the baby safe. But the truth is, we still don’t know if we can trust you guys. I mean… your demons, and well... your demons.” Sam rubbed the back of his neck and Dean wasn’t sure where his brother was going with this. “But, I agree… I think maybe keeping her here, with you guys—

“—What the hell, Sam?” Dean grabbed his brother on the shoulder.

“Think about it, they’ve got more firepower than we do, and yeah I mean, we don’t know them. Which is why, I think we need to come to an agreement.”

“Which is?”

“One of us needs to stay here, and one of you”—Sam gestured to the demons—“needs to come back with us. It’ll keep everyone honest.”

Nobody looked particularly fond of the idea, but no one seemed to have a better alternative. Dean saw Cas’ figure from the corner of his eye. It was an opportunity to escape the taunt of his addiction he couldn’t shake off.

“I’ll stay,” he said, his words a shade too quick.

Cas’ face turned sharply in his direction, eyes shot wide. “You are _not_ staying here.”

“Excuse me? What are you, my mom?”

“No,” Mary came up beside him, “but I am. Dean,” her voice lowered. He wanted to remind her they had super hearing and it didn’t matter, but it was pointless. “We have no way of knowing we can trust them, and Mick said—”

Fuck that guy! “Mick can suck my dick, _mother._ That asshole, and _you_ might I add, nearly got Cas killed so excuse me if I’d rather take my chances with seven giant man-demons.”

One of the demons stifled a laugh and Dean would bet it was the smirky one.

“Mom,” Sam placed a calming hand on her shoulder, “Dean’s right. Right now, this is our best plan. And frankly, I think we need to keep Mick in the dark on this.”

She shook her head, pissed. “Here I am trying to make this world better for both of you and you’re volunteering to live with demons!”

It wasn't funny, but it kind of was. “Mom, it ain’t like I’m marrying one of them. Relax.”

Someone murmured, it sounded like, “ _Not yet.”_ But Dean very studiously ignored that. It also didn’t escape his notice that Cas’ lip seemed to curl in the direction of the low flung comment.

Sam reached the end of his patience before the rest of them. “Everyone shut up. Dean and Kelly, you’re staying here. Cas, Mom, and—You”—he gestured to one of the demons—“come with me.”

“Matt.”

Dean shot the selected demon a look, nearly thrown into hysterics. “Your name is Matt? Big bad demon, and your name is _Matt_.”

Matt, with the sharp angles and thin smile said, “Is that difficult for you, human. Shall I rip your arm off and use your severed limb to spell my name in the dirt?”

The leader of the demons put his hand out. “Enough.”

It was settled then, everyone seemed to finally relax and their two groups shuffled and changed places as needed. Dean now standing on the side of the enemy.

He looked forward without seeing, knowing Cas was glaring at him—feeling it on the back of his neck. Before they walked away, he let himself take in Cas’ expression, the tight set of his lips, the fire in his eyes.

Yes, it was better this way. Remove the temptation and all would be good.

Sam nodded to Dean, and he returned the gesture. Dean threw his brother the keys to the Impala and turned around to follow his new house guests across a wide lawn.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I'm close to Wednesday lol <3

Avoiding Cas was definitely something he knew he’d needed, but shacking up with seven ancient demons and a pregnant lady wasn’t exactly Dean’s first choice of options. As the group of them approached the house, he wondered how it housed them all.

The brick walls were standard by his assessment, the windows didn’t seem reinforced. Someone would need to remind him pretty fucking soon why this was _oh-so-better_ than the bunker. Other than being conveniently separate from where Cas happened to be. 

Their anxiety at his presence, a stranger about to invade their home, was apparent. As he followed the line of men down a stone walkway, he felt suffocated by testosterone. Poor Kelly, how she managed all this for weeks was a damn miracle.

As they funnelled inside, Dean immediately understood why they’d boasted the superiority of their base. While the outside had been unassuming, brick and windows and a sloped roof, the inside was nothing like a home.

A hallway followed every exterior wall, and beside it, a barrier of concrete. A base within a base, and as they crossed through a thick steel door to the inside of the concrete room, all there was were two metal doors. An elevator.

Dean was none-too-kindly shoved in, the rest of them packing in like sardines. Kelly seemed so hilariously out of place Dean couldn’t hold back a snort. The leader, at least he assumed as much, turned back to glare at him.

“Should we, uh, introduce ourselves… or?” Dean tried to make eye contact around group, only Mr. Smirky didn’t turn away.

Man, what was with that guy?

When the doors opened, a burly one took hold of Dean’s jacket and dragged him down a corridor away from the others. “You know,” mentioned Dean, “I can tell you Matt is going to be getting far better treatment from my brother than you’re giving me.”

Burly Beard barely glanced at him.

“Whatever.” Dean was resigned to his fate, had already decided this was better than the alternative. And, ya know, he didn’t entirely hate being shoved around. It took away all anxiety associated with making a decision.

They passed dozens of rooms, some doors were closed, others were open to offices and large sitting rooms that ranged from being so fancy Dean thought he’d have to speak with a British accent if he entered, and others so locker-room chic he got whiplash. Who the hell were these behemoths?

After what felt like the trek of a lifetime, Dean was thrown to the right—his body crash-landing on a furry carpet with a thud. Cautiously, he took a gander of the room. The ceiling was decorated with concentric circles, paintings that looked expensive hung on the walls, and a u-shaped couch dominated most of the space.

“Sit.”

Dean groaned and got to his feet. He crossed his arms and resolutely did not sit.

Burly Beans strode into the room and shoved Dean hard enough he stumbled back three feet, calves bumping the couch where he landed unwillingly on his ass. He stared up at his assigned man-handler, glaring through his eyelashes.

“Stay.”

“Want me to bark, too?” he sneered.

Burly rolled his eyes and disappeared down the hall. The instant he was gone, Dean was on his feet. He scoured the room, but there really wasn’t much to it. The paintings were something else. Colourful and textured. He had to laugh because all he could picture was the snooty biatch from the liquour store and her gape of shock if she were to imagine the alcoholic standing in an underground base surrounded by super demons and like, fucking Rembrandts or something.

One painting, a kaleidoscope of blues and greens, with the faintest hint of yellow captured his attention. Crossing the painting was a greyish-black ridge. It seemed out of place, as if it was breaking the geometrics of the pattern below. Entranced and lacking anything else to do, he reached out, curious to see if it was as ragged as it looked—

“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

Dean spun around to the sound of a woman’s voice, not Kelly’s. No, the woman standing in front of him wasn’t comparable.

“Unless you like being knocked out cold,” she added, smiling.

“Uh, not usually.” He said nothing else and took her in.

While the room wasn’t big by any means, it seemed to stretch out around her. She was not just small, but tiny. Her hair was the sort of blonde you hardly see, the kind that usually comes with youth and disappears over time. It was so blonde it was almost grey. It sat flat against her, draping halfway down her arms, looking too thick for her frame.

“Dean?”

He nodded. “And you are?”

“Alis.” Not pronounced Alice, but Aleese. He’d never heard it before.

“Well, not to be blunt but what the hell is someone like you doing here with all these goons.”

She rolled her eyes, they were a soft brown. “They’re not goons. Anyway, I wasn’t supposed to come in here, Eadric would have a meltdown. But I had to find out… was Castiel with you?”

This was just getting more and more complicated. “Cas? You know him?”

She cocked her head, a secretive smile catching her petite mouth. “Oh yes, I know him.”

“That sounds...” _sexual._ His expression must have alluded to the word he didn’t say. Not to mention his distaste in associating anyone else with Cas in that way.

“Oh!” She laughed, her laugh loud and thick like her hair. “God no, not like that. I used to tease him a very long time ago. He’s very much a brother to me… though to be honest, it’s been so long now, he may not remember me. We knew each other before humans were civilized.”

“A brother to you? Are you—”

Her smile then was faint, but sneaky. The room grew dark and her skin became lighter, a dimmer switch sliding up. Shadows he recognized stretched behind her. They weren’t broken or damaged the way Cas’ were.

“Fucking Christ, you’re an angel?!”

“Humans have the most beautiful vocabulary.”

Dean chuckled. “Cas once told me there was a joke in enochian about breeding with the mouth of a goat, so I’d say we’re even. But, back to the blockbuster here, why is an angel living with seven demons and a pregnant lady?”

“It’s a long, long story.” She sat down on the couch. “But all love stories are, aren’t they. I imagine you know that.”

Reluctantly, he took a seat opposite her on the far side of the couch. “I don’t, actually.”

She flashed a wise smile in his direction. “Liar.”

For a stranger, she sure as hell seemed to read him with ease. It reminded him, this whole place and the entire day he’d had, that no matter how many secrets of the underworld he uncovered over the years, he’d barely scratched the surface.

Not only was there so much more than he could conceive of, it was all mingled and complicated. More the reason why Mary shouldn’t be off making deals with Ketch to wipe out every last bad mofo out there.

“This may be a dumb question but, is this where they plan to keep me?”

“No, no. Someone will come in soon. I should take off. See you at dinner maybe?”

Weirdest day ever. “Uh, I guess…”

As she popped up from the couch to leave the room, he took notice of what she was wearing and barely held back a guffaw. A purple, thick-strapped tanktop, which was normal… but on the bottom were grey sweatpants sporting the familiar logo of the Carver Edlund Supernatural Series splayed across her ass.

Dean was still shaking his head in disbelief when the leader stepped into the room. This time, he was alone. “Here’s how this is going to work, hunter. You will stay here and you won’t try to open any locked doors. You’ll keep to yourself and answer questions we ask of you, that clear?”

“So long as your man does the same with my brother.”

“He will.”

“Fine. Care to tell me your name or should I just call you Snarly. Though it’s a bit too close to Burly and Smirky, and frankly, I’m running out of dwarf nicknames here.”

Snarly… well, snarled. “Zeta.”

“Weird name.”

“You’re named after a gun,” Zeta retorted.

“Well, yeah, but that’s cool as shit.”

“I understand why there are so few American poets.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “Look, Z—”

“Zeta.”

“—Appreciate the glowing hospitality, but it’s been a day, if you know what I mean so I’d love it if you would show me to my room, or dungeon. Honestly, I don’t care.”

Zeta had curly dark hair and a trimmed beard, his skin almost the exact shade of coffee Sam preferred. And yet, for all the dark and handsome going on, his eyes were light, maybe purple or lilac, Dean wasn’t sure. It was an interesting effect. 

“Follow me,” Zet walked from the room and turned left back the way Dean had already been. There was no one else around, no one he knew, and Dean suddenly realized how bad this could go. Given the fortress this place was, would Cas even feel it if something happened to him?

If he prayed, right now, would the angel hear it?

They turned right at some point, then another right, and a left, and Dean was lost. Maybe that was the point. To bury him in a hole in this place and they’d never have to lock any doors cause he couldn’t find his way out if he tried.

Finally, Zet pushed open a door and ushered Dean inside. It was a comparable space to the bunker’s rooms. Nothing fancy. A bed, dresser, and side table. Of course, the dresser would be empty and Dean hadn’t exactly packed for a little vacay.

“Uh,” he turned around, “I might need some clothes, at some point, and if you don’t want me stinking up your hallways… maybe a bathroom?”

“Do you always ask such stupid questions?”

“Only when I’m being extra fun.”

Zeta did not care for his attitude, stalking across the room to another door. He opened it and there was a deep closet filled with generic clothes. “There should be something here for you. The bathroom is across the hall. Someone will come get you for dinner.”

“Dinner…” Dean huffed a short laugh, “so you all sit down to eat dinner, like a family.”

“We are a family.”

Riiiight. “Okay, sure.”

Question period was over, the ruler of the demon house left and shut the door behind him. Dean let out a long sigh of relief he hadn’t known he was holding back. A dangerous move though, as the minute all of his banked anxiety faded into ether, every need and fantasy he’d been fighting strode right back in. 

“Ah, come on!” he groused.

Stomping to the bed, he crashed onto it and dragged the pillow over his face, letting out a small scream of frustration. It was like drowning, the water separating you from air and it was all you could feel or see. That was how his desire for Cas existed in his mind.

Normally, he would drink right about now or roll a joint. Hmm, he wondered for a moment what Cas might say if he knew he was the reason Dean was fueling his addictions so hard the last few days.

You know all this would be way easier if Cas didn’t smell so good, or punch people the way he did. The angel clocked mofo’s in the most nonchalant manner Dean had ever witnessed, and every damn time, it sent a fiery buzz right down to his dick.

And his hair! _I mean, come on._ Somebody walks into your room looking like they’ve just been fucked three ways to Sunday and you’re expected to _not_ think of them laying naked under you, shouting at you to “Ride them harder.”

Alright, so Dean had particular fantasies and had probably seen more cowboy porn than any human should watch, but still.

Dean dragged the pillow off his face and stared at the ceiling. It was arched and all he could think of was how much of a bitch that would’ve been to plaster. Pretty though.

“What now?” he asked the room, realizing he had zero alcohol on him, no computer, no weed… and wasn’t quite comfortable enough yet to blow a load in the guest bed offered to him by seven man-demons from a billion years ago.

This was going to be interesting...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I swear, porn is coming!


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank God I wrote so much of this before :) Enjoy.

Dean startled awake at the _bang-bang-bang_ coming from the door. Wiping his sleep-crusted eyes and scratching his day-old beard, he flung his legs off the bed and walked to the door to yank it open.

“What.”

It took him a moment to clear his vision, and there before him was Smirky. “You look hungry.”

Dean snorted. _You have no idea._ “What time is it?”

“Time for dinner, obviously.” The demon half-smiled and offered his arm in gentlemanly fashion, “Come on, I’m your escort.”

Not exactly the sort of escort Dean was used to. Still half asleep, he actually reached out until he realized what he was doing and snapped his hand back, shaking his head. “Smirky’s the annoying one,” Dean mumbled to himself.

The demon laughed, and Dean narrowed his eyes to fully assess this peculiar dude. He was shorter than Dean, but fractionally. His frame was slighter too, no doubt he was one agile fucker in a fight. The sides of his head were shaved, the top long and dark and brushed back where it tapered to a buzz cut. There was something faintly Peurto Rican about his features. 

“My name is Rye, by the way.”

It suited him. His eyes were crisp blue with an outer ring of brown, the edges peaked inward. It reminded Dean of a strange distant planet.

Dean ignored the still offered arm and brushed past the demon to exit the room. “So what’s your story?”

They walked down the hall, side-by-side. Rye stared at him from the corner of his strange eyes. “Ha. How much time do you have?”

He shrugged. “Depends on Kelly’s due date I guess.”

“Then approximately four months, give or take. We’re sort of in unknown territory on this one, as you can imagine.” Dean harrumphed but let the demon ramble on. He was a talker. “We haven’t had fresh blood in the house in a while, well not blood blood, we’re not vampires or anything. You know what I mean. It’s wicked to finally have other people to talk to; as you can imagine we don’t go out much. Too many hunters with itchy trigger fingers and the goddanm Men of Letters right up our ass all the time. Speaking of up the ass—”

Dean snapped to the right.

“—I want to ride you until Christmas.”

He stopped walking. He couldn’t exactly process what had just been said. Dean furrowed his brows at Rye. When nothing else came to mind, he just said, “Christmas is like, six months away.”

“I have _excellent_ stamina.”

Dean opened his mouth, snapped it shut and started walking. Blindly down the hall, having no idea where to go. Rye jogged to catch up with him. “Is that a no, or…”

Looking over at the other man, he shook his head in disbelief. “No.”

“Damn. Do you know how hard it is to find people to date when you’re really, really old. And a demon, _and_ into dudes. The dating pool is like zilch. Fucking bummer, man.” They turned a corner, and a flood of noise—silverware and chatter—rose towards them. “Thank god for gay porn!” he hollered, just as they stepped into an oversized dining room.

Several headshakes were thrown their way and one of the demons he had yet to meet walked over and grabbed his elbow, gearing him to a seat. “Sorry about that fuck up. He has issues.”

“I don’t have issues, Dexter, I’m just _horny,_ you bearded moron!”

Who the hell were these people? Dean sat down and tried to blend into the furniture. All of them seemed to be in attendance, save for the woman he'd met. Their leader, Zeta, and Dexter—the one who’d guided Dean to a seat and indeed had one hell of a beard, Rye the Smirker, and the others, sans Matt.

When they all sat, none of them reached for the food on the table, but instead directed their attention to Zet.

“I suppose now’s a good a time as any to make introductions,” he started off, a slight accent to his words that Dean hadn’t caught before. With a sweep of his hand, he went around the table: “To my right is Rye, who you’ve met and whom I apologize for”—the demon in question huffed indignantly—“then we have Alex, Dex, Eadric, and Gray.”

Dean nodded, they knew his name so there was really no point in speaking out. Chitchat wasn’t on his mind just then, not when a viking feast took up half the table. It wasn’t fancy, but it looked damn good.

“Oh, and before we eat, I’ve asked the women not to join us because frankly I don’t know or like you very much and some of the others are very uneasy around strangers and we don’t like broken dishes or wasted chicken legs.”

“Uh, how many women live here? You guys starting up some free shelter or something.”

The one named Eadric traded a look with the leader, Dean recognized the exchange as he and Sam had whole conversations often without saying a word.

Eadric, a demon with what Dean could only identify as hockey-hair and a playoff beard, turned to face him. He too had a strange set of eyes: deep green, not the way Dean’s were green, but the way emeralds were green. Sharp and dimensional. “There are three women in total. One of them is my wife.”

“The angel?” he asked without thinking.

Hockey-demon shot up from his chair. “You know her?!”

“Whoa-whoa, she came to see me when I first got here. She knows Cas, I guess. Wanted to make acquaintances or whatever.”

Eadric slowly sat down, almost reluctant. “They were close once. A long time ago.”

“So I hear.”

“And you and the angel, you’re close too?”

Dean swallowed and considered trying to escape. He went with the truth as he knew it, “He’s family.”

Most of them took his reply at face value. Rye chortled a laugh, head thrown back and all. “Yeah, family you wanna stick it to.”

Alex, a quiet one, smacked Rye on the back of the head. The assaulted demon punched his buddy in the chest. They both stopped horsing around when a low growl cut through the room. It wasn’t a man’s pissed off growl, it was a demonic— _cooked up in the bowels of Hell_ —snarl.

Dean was pretty sure his nuts took a little vacay up inside his body from the sound of it.

At some unknown cue, the feast began. Minutes dragged by awkwardly with nothing but the sound of seven men eating chicken and arguably the best fucking scalloped potatoes Dean had ever shovelled into his mouth.

If nothing else, his self-assigned rehab joint had some quality grub. And hey, if he ate enough, maybe he could grow a middle-aged man-gut and not have to worry about Cas ever being attracted to him. Though, he already had some pudge. And he hated it. Not that he wanted himself and Cas to hook up, but if they did. Well shit, he wouldn’t want to feel flubby. Even now, he could feel his jeans pinching.

Maybe he should stop eating.

No! _No!_ He would not let his growing need for Cas squander his other, well-loved, addictions. Bring on the chicken!! Cluck-cluck motherfucker.

Man, chicken skin was good. He moaned. As if he even considered tapering back his dietary, _um_ , needs. Yeah, dietary needs. He was a hunter dammit, and hunters needed calories. It was oddly silent, he realized, and raised his head—mouthful of chicken—to see every one of the other men glaring at him. “What?” he mumbled, defaulting to offended.

Of course it was Rye who answered. “Dude, you moan like a whore when you eat.”

Hot embarrassment rose up his neck to settle in his cheeks. “Fuck you,” he muttered, and took another bite.

After the gluttonous consummation of chicken and potatoes, the men rose and left without a whole lot of exchanges between them. Dean wasn’t sure what to do or whether he could leave without asking. But asking seemed stupid, and he wasn’t a prisoner here.

He stood up and went to leave, wondering how long it would take him to find his room.

Rye was beside him in seconds. “Do you even know where you’re going?”

“My room.”

“Boring!” the demon sang. “Come on, follow me.”

He debated it, especially considering this was the same demon who apparently had a hard-on for him, but in the end, what the hell else was he to do. They’d turned down a narrower hallway and since it felt too cramped walking alongside the man, he followed behind.

More and more, Dean realized how much of a maze this place was. No doubt it was a fortress to being with, but the catacombs of hallways could easily split an enemy invasion. It’d be easy to pick people off if you knew the place well enough.

“You guys ever get lost down here.”

Rye looked over his shoulder and winked, “Do you _want_ to get lost down here?”

He rolled his eyes. “Nevermind, I’ll go find my room.” Turning, he made it a half-step before there was a hand grasping the back of his shirt and dragging him in reverse down the hall.

“Alright, alright!” He tried to jerk away but Rye just started humming an unknown song and used his superior demonic strength to pull Dean along. Dean stumbled and remained in a continuous state of falling but not falling until they came to doubleset of doors.

Inside the room was pretty well everything a man could ever want. Heck, he half expected to see a stripper walk up to him. It was large and open, but there were sections of activity. A set of couches in one area with a large tv and every gaming console imaginable, a pool table, a bar, a fucking hottub around a half wall, and a giant wood table that looked older than Dean’s car and battered in the way the Impala definitely wasn’t.

This room was every dude’s mancave fantasy and then some.

“We have other rooms that have cool shit but thought you’d appreciate this one.”

Dean beelined for the bar and started to scour the shelf. “Thank god, and here I thought I was gonna have to go dry for the next few weeks.”

The other guy gave a fake gasp and said, “We're not in the business of torturing our guests.”

He smiled and went for a familiar Whiskey, probably the cheapest they kept. The demon seemed surprised but didn’t stop him. The first gulp was such a relief, knowing he wouldn’t be forced to return to his room sober.

“Why do you drink?”

Dean scrunched his face, looking at Rye with surprise. “Why does anyone? It’s good.”

“Sometimes. You’re not drinking for a good time, though. You’re drinking for a whole different reason.”

“How about we file that under none of your damn business.”

“Ooh, touchy. Fine. I have other things to do anyway. If you can’t find your room after there’s a phone over by the pool table, press four.”

“That you?”

“Why? Is four your lucky number?”

Pouring a full glass, Dean shot the demon a look. “Never stop, do you?”

“Do you know how many times I’ve watched all of them fall in love, over and over. So be annoyed all you want, man, I don’t care. I’ve been alone for approximately five billion years… think about that.”

“That sucks,” was all Dean managed to say.

Rye blowed out a breath, “Yeah.” He turned away, the last of his voice carrying back, “And yes, my number is four.”

Left by himself, Dean tried not to think of the strangeness of the day. He took his full glass, the bottle too, and wandered over to the hot-tub. As hard as he thought about it, he wasn’t sure he’d ever been in one.

Fuck.This _was_ a goddamn vacation. He had half a mind to send up a thanks to Chuck but thought better of it. Dean was still a bit pissed off at how that whole thing had gone down.

He didn’t have swim shorts. Though, he didn’t own any. But his boxers were black and that would have to do. Placing his glass and bottle over to the side, he dragged the cover off and tucked it off to the side where it was obviously meant to go. The controls were fairly self-explanatory, and after punching a few buttons the jets kicked into high gear. Rolling bubbles and a whirring sound filling the room; louder than he expected.

Glancing around, he double-checked he was alone and stripped down. He took his booze and stepped into the steamy water. It probably took him close to ten minutes to get in, because damn, it was fucking hot.

When he finally settled, the bubbles danced around his chest, jets shot water against his back and nothing had ever felt so fucking good.

“Sammy,” he breathed, “we are soooo buying a hot-tub.”

Time lost meaning as he enjoyed the heat sinking deep into his bones, the feel of sweat prickling his hairline. It was a strange end to a strange day,

And about to get stranger.

“My, my. Dean Winchester.”

Thrashing upright, water flopping over the side to slither to a square drain, Dean's eyes shot across the vast room to see someone he never thought he’d see again.

“So,” she said, “how’s Clarence?”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Only a day late :) Sorry

“Meg?” With wavy dark brown hair, and the snarky eyebrow he remembered, there she was. The demon who once tried to kill him and his brother, and was supposed to be dead. “But how…”

She strode over, wearing black skinny jeans and an oversized t-shirt; a man’s t-shirt. “In the flesh. As are you apparently...” She hummed suggestively, but that was her nature, not meant to be a come on.

“Sam watched you die.”

“Did he though?”

“Crowley, he—”

She cut him off, “—Crowley had to _think_ he’d killed me.”

He thought of getting out of the tub, but knew his boxers would stick like saran wrap to his junk so he decided to stay hidden under bubbles. “How did you end up here?”

“I’d been running from Crowley, as I’m sure you remember. Happened to run into a certain someone, and as they say: The rest is history.” She smiled then. No, she _swooned_.

“You’re shacked up with one of these guys?”

She grinned, stalking forward and for a split-second Dean wondered if she planned to join him. No thanks to that. With an obvious roll of her eyes, she gawked the way she used to. It bothered him before, but mostly because her stare had always been set on Cas. “I am,” she said finally.

“Which one?”

“Grayson. He’s the kinkiest one.” She winked, close enough now to lean on the side of the hot-tub, making Dean uneasy.

“I tell ya, this has been one weirdass day.”

“Tell me about it. Has Rye made a pass at you yet?”

He laughed without humour, and took a sip of his drink. “Several.”

“Poor baby. Hot guys hitting you, how terrible.” She paused, one dark eyebrow cocking upwards. “You’re just cranky cause it’s not Cas.”

“Shut up.” Wrapping his fingers around the bottle this time, Dean flooded his gullet with whiskey.

“Jealous before, weren’t ya?” As she teased him, she poked his naked shoulder.

Two could play this game. “Tell me, _Meg_ , does your newbie demon-husband know all the horrible things you’ve done? Cause, seems to me, these guys are pretty damn decent. They might not be too pleased to hear about your ugly ass past.”

Hiking her backside up onto the ledge of the tub, she sneered down at him. “Actually, jackass, he knows everything. That’s what love is, you idiot. That’s why—if Cas hadn’t been crazybeans and we’d had more time, I think he and I could’ve been quite the item. He knew what I was, what I’d done… still, he thought I was beautiful.”

“And thorny,” he countered.

“Doesn’t matter. We had plans to rearrange some furniture. you know.”

Wow, he wanted to hit things. Fuck it—he was getting out of the tub. If she saw his dick, well, so be it. Rising from the water, planes of wetness cascaded down his torso. And his boxers—as expected—sucked inward and plastered to his skin. The entire length of his warmed-up cock and balls was visible in sharp detail through the cotton underwear.

He met her eyes. She didn’t look down, but held his stare for a too-long awkward moment. She grinned, wide and villainous the way she used to. “Don’t worry, Dean, our tug of war is long over. I’m happily married.” At that, she wiggled her ring finger in his direction.

It was exactly like her; dark and twisted and strangely beautiful. Not that he’d ever admit it. After all, she did try to kill him more than once.

“Congrats.”

She smiled with less venom than before and got up with purpose, her short stature disappearing behind the low wall and returning with an oversized fluffy towel. With an expert toss, she threw it his way and he dried himself off.

It smelled like lilacs and felt as soft as puppy fur. Stupid demons and their stupid nice house and soft towels.

“So, um,” she hesitated her words. She was nervous. “Is he coming here too?”

“Who? _Cas?_ ”

“No, Lucifer dumbass. Of course, Cas.”

Hopefully not. If he was trapped in an underground maze full of good food, booze, and a hot-tub, he’d wind up on the pool table with his ass in the air screaming Cas’ name. Or, you know, something of that sort. “Probably not.”

“Too bad. There’s a sex room.” With that, she winked and sauntered out of the room.

Annoyed, Dean grabbed for his clothes and was determined to traipse through every damn hallway until he found his room.

 

It took approximately forty minutes. Ridiculous. By then it was late, he grabbed his phone that was in his jeans but it had no reception. Not exactly surprising, considering he was buried in concrete.

Thankfully, there was a phone on the side table. No doubt it was monitored but he called Sam anyway to touch base. It was a quick call, but not boring in the least. Dean relayed nearly every moment of his experience, cutting out Rye’s advances. Sam, in turn, told him all of what Matt had to say, which apparently wasn’t much.

“Should I tell Cas about this other angel. Alis? And Meg?”

He was sitting on the side of the bed in nothing but the towel, his wet boxers wrenched off and flung into the closet. “I don’t know. Is he there right now?”

“In a room somewhere yeah.”

“And mom?”

There was a heavy pause. “I, uh, I kicked her out.”

Holy shit. “Really?”

“Yeah. You were right… I just. I never knew her, Dean. I had nothing. And so I thought—”

“—You’d take whatever you got.”

It was silent and Dean could picture his brother’s face. Sammy had lost so much, and however many times Dean lamented over the loss of his own childhood, he would’ve suffered worse in a heartbeat if it meant giving his little brother a better life.

“Yeah,” replied Sam, his voice low.

“I get it, and shit, I don’t even blame you. But she almost got Cas killed…”

“I know.” It was hard to listen to the compassion and understanding in his brother’s voice. A reminder that his brother knew all too well how Dean felt about the angel. “So listen, Cas isn’t in the room, but I can go find him if you want. He’s probably drilling Matt again.” Dean nearly fell on his face, before Sam hastily added, “For questions I mean. Obviously.”

“No, no, it’s fine. Leave him be. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

After hanging up the phone, he laid back on the bed. Half the whiskey waited for him on the bedside table but he looked over at it and decided not to finish it off.

The towel was damp against him, thick and heavy around his hips. The cool air in the room flowed over his skin, a relief against the inferno inside him leftover from however long he’d been in the hot-tub.

As he drifted closer to cold than hot, his nipples hardened, but the liquor sat warm in his belly. The contradiction of it stirred his senses, and he shut off his mind—letting his limbs sink into the mattress.

Dean closed his eyes, felt the room sway. His heart beat heavily the way it does after too long in the sun. It didn’t escape his attention that the towel grew tight at the centre of his hips, but he refused to touch.

He was in a perfect moment, you see. Lazily aroused, not a thought in sight. Any movement could shatter the feeling. He let his cock twitch and fill. But arousal was often like a sports car, it doesn’t like to idle in the lower gears. There was a surge of revs no matter the pressure of your foot.

Biting back a moan, his hips canted up off the bed, the soft towel dragging infinitesimally against his shaft. “Fuck,” he breathed.   

And just like, alongside the spoken curse, a vivid image of Cas rose in his mind. It made him angry, and he knew he couldn’t help himself now. It was only self-indulgence, he told himself. With the substance of his addiction out of reach, he could give in to this and not worry about it driving him over the edge.

The return of Meg, with her cocky eyebrow and sly mouth, had a way of reminding Dean of every moment he watched between her and the angel. How they’d looked at each other, how Cas had kissed her… with his strong body shoved up against hers. Bet she’d felt every curve, bulge, and muscle. The slick feel of his tongue in her mouth—

 _Oh_ , would you look at that, Dean was palming his own dick.

Man, getting off to thoughts of _Meg_ with Cas was really not the way to go here. Thanks to the wonders of imagination, he plucked her out and took her place in the fantasy. Except in his version, they were alone in that grubby hallway and Cas was tearing off Dean’s clothes.

It was rough, same as every other daydream he’d ever entertained. Anything soft was too terrifying, too close to the emotions he steered clear of.

Dean dragged his hand over the towel, squeezing the hard swell of his cock over and over. He imagined Cas spinning him around and pressing his face against the concrete, kicking his bare feet apart and…

“Fuck,” he groaned, pressing off the bed to grind against his own hand.

Cas would bite him, Dean was sure of that. It was easy to picture the act, to feel Cas’ phantom teeth sink into the meat of his shoulder. Falling further into the fantasy, he imagined a warm hand—hotter and softer than his own—curling around his sex, pumping him mercilessly.

In real time, he rocked into the pressure of his own palm, jerking with his thumb and finger against the head of his cock. All of it still over the towel, as he found something strangely erotic about the soft graze of the fabric.

He heard Cas’ voice at his ear, in the dream, but it felt real—so real he couldn’t breathe from the sudden force of the unsatisfied addiction roaring in him. “Let me make love to you, Dean.”

 _Make love._ LOVE. Because that was Cas, that was what he would offer if Dean ever asked. And it tortured him, like fissures were cracking through every rib.

In the moment, he bit his lip. In the dream, Cas was sliding into him—thick and unrelenting.

It sent him over the edge, a sharp and guttural, “Uhh-uhh-uhh” flying past his lips as he viciously squeezed the hard line of his cock in fast repetitions, come spilling into the folders of the towel, dripping free to smear his skin.

His breath was ragged and fast for a long while after. Tired as he was by then, Dean was a nice enough houseguest to ball up the now-sullied towel and bury it under his wet boxers in the closet. He crawled back into bed without a stitch on and curled on his side.

Cas’ name sat on his lips like half-remembered kiss.  All he’d have to do, if he were at the bunker, would be to breathe the name, think it, scream it. Fuck he could probably draw it across his skin and knew it wouldn’t be long before Cas would come to him.

Satisfying the clawing of his addiction would be _that_ easy. One moment of weakness was all it would take.

Where they went from there was on him.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, slow burn is niiiiice. So maybe Thursday's are my new day, Wednesday's always seem so chaotic. I haven't actually written anything in WEEKS. Everything I have been posting was already written like months ago. But I need to catch up because I only have about five ish more chapters pre-written and that will come faster than I think. 
> 
> Also I had to drop out of Cockles Big Bang because I just don't have the time. Work is insane, and I feel like I can't even afford to start a family. Man I love the private sector but not having a pension means saving for retirement to the point where I am basically putting myself in debt... it's stupid. (wow, talk about a rant or what... sorry guys). Read on ;)

By mid the next week, Sam was demanding they meet up. Part of his insistent nagging was probably a result of the way Dean kept describing the place. And fair enough, it was swank as shit. Dean didn’t want to leave.

He’d spoken to everyone by this point, had watched a few chick flicks with Kelly and played pool with Meg. She won every time. Rye often caught Dean’s eye, not because he was nice to look at, but because Dean saw the sorrow deep in the dual-tone of his eyes. To be honest, he was feeling bad for the guy.

Not that he’d changed his mind on letting the demon have a round, but now, he could see them being friends.

After Sam had bitched enough, Dean floated the idea of getting everyone together. And so that was happening tonight. Whether or not Cas would be coming, Dean wasn’t sure. He knew Sam had told Cas about Meg and Alis and it was a pretty safe bet the angel would show.

Which was exactly why Dean was half in the bag and contemplating getting himself purposefully lost.

Rye sauntered up to him. “How you holding up?”

In a very timely manner, Dean hiccuped and shot Rye a grin. “Awesome.”

The demon laughed and shook his head. “Man, I can’t wait to watch this reality tv show.” He left to go talk to his buddies and Dean leaned over the bar and waited for the inevitable.

Finally, an hour or so later, Zeta strode in with Sam, Matt, and Cas following behind. Dean watched from an angle, staring through his lashes at the array of expressions dancing through Cas’ face. Wonder, then shock and disbelief, and finally a soft smile. The sort of smile Dean rarely saw anymore. It wasn't directed at him...

Cas was enveloped by Alis first, his arms hoisted her off the ground while her thick white-blonde hair whipped around his neck. When he put her down, Meg was waiting her turn, leaning casually against the one leather sofa, a smirk playing at the corners of her mouth.

“Hello Clarence.”

He said nothing, which annoyed Dean. Then moved towards her and pulled her into a soft hug. That too, made Dean a little twitchy.

“Now that _that’s_ over,” Dean said loudly, “let’s drink!”

Sam flipped him a look, lips pressed tight. “We need to talk about the Men of Letters.”

“That can wait.” Dean glanced at their demon hostesses. “Right?”

Dexter grunted, Zeta didn’t seem to care one way or another, and Rye skipped his way over, flung his arm around Dean’s waist and snatched the drink from his hand. “Damn right!” He finished it off in one long gulp.

As much as Dean really didn’t care for the guy, it was worth the discomfort to see Cas’ unbanked rage. _Huh_. Jealousy on Cas was … hot. Like, really hot.

With an awkward start, and hesitant side conversations, their two groups blended together with the fuel of alcohol and the helpful charms of Alis and Kelly.

“Tell me again why you and him aren’t together?” asked Rye, both of them as far away from the others as possible. Sam was off with Eadric looking at schmancy paintings or some garbage and Meg was teaching Cas how to play pool. Needless to say Dean was in an  _excellent_ mood.

“God, why are you so annoying!”

The demon scrunched his nose, like a punkish bunny rabbit. “Are you fucking kidding me. Millions of years, Dean. _Millions_ . And you have fated love practically dick-slapping you in the face and you’re all ‘ _Oooh poor me I’ve died and come back to life a million times and love is hard, waahh waah waah.’_ Grow a pair, jackass.”

Dean fired a look at Rye—his new reluctant friend. “Kindly fuck off.”

“No.”

“My god.” Dean spoke to the air, “I’m going to murder him, I’m _actually_ going to murder him.”

“Ha! Give it a try, I dare you,” taunted Rye.

Was this what being friends with someone was like because Dean used to wish he had more friends, he’s second-guessing that now. “Rye, do me a favour please, just get me another drink.”

“A drink… of Cas’ spunk?”

Dean raised his fist, he literally held it up and was ready to throw it forward. “I swear to God.”

“Oh, rela—” Pausing mid-word, Rye’s galaxy-like eyes shot to the side, his jaw hinging open.

Following his gaze, Dean looked over to find Cas staring at them from the far side of the room. Sure, he wasn't exactly smiling their way, but Dean didn’t see the reason for the look on Rye’s face until he blurted, “That angelic motherfucker just growled at me.”

Dean snorted. “I really doubt that.”

“I’m telling you, he all but walked over and peed around you.”

“Okay, that’s it I’m going to my room. Later.” Dean stomped off and didn’t turn back. He had no idea where Sam had gone off to, and was holding too much booze to care.

He knew the halls on this level enough by now to navigate his way, even drunk, back to his room. Inside, he slammed the door shut and debated tossing the glass in his hand across the room, but it wasn’t his room and sexual frustration wasn’t reason enough to explode glass everywhere.

Dean shoved and kicked off his jeans and wiggled out of his button-up, not having the patience to undo the individual clasps. In the generic white t-shirt and expensive boxer-briefs he tunneled under the covers—still holding his glass perfectly balanced—and relaxed in the silence.

Had Cas actually growled? Man, he wished he’d heard that. Heard it, recorded it, set it on replay when he was set to jack off next. Although, that might create one hella weird pavlovian response.

With his eyes closed, and the blankets heavy on his back, the cool glass loose in his grip, Dean realized how drunk he was. The entire room spun, and he felt full and knew he’d fall asleep only to have to stumble drunkenly across the hall at some point to relieve himself.

Might as well do it now.

He swept the blankets off, carefully set his drink on the bedside table and bumbled around in the dark until he found the door. He went across the hall and did his thing, having enough brainpower to brush his teeth knowing his sober self would appreciate his courtesies in the morning.

Staring at himself in the mirror, he saw the red flush from his chest to his forehead. He got that way with booze sometimes. He leaned forward and stared into his own eyes. They were bloodshot. He pulled back his lips and gave a harsh smile, getting a nice up-close gander of his teeth.

_What was he doing?_

Dean rubbed his stubbled jaw and sighed. Emotion, a tidal wave of it, crashed over him. His memories of Cas—being saved, quiet conversations, running and fighting together in dark places, flashes of betrayal, moments of _awareness_ —it all flowed through him, tangled in his own history.

One moment stood out over the rest, he wasn’t sure why. There was nothing necessarily specific about it to set it apart from the others. He’d barely known the angel at the time. Alastair, Dean’s sadistic mentor from the depths of Hell, was racked and served up on a platter by the angels, ready for torture at Dean’s hand.

Cas’ voice, rough and heavy, said to him, “I would give anything for you not to do this.”

Even then, the angel knew him to his core. Knew that taking a knife to Alastair, no matter how bad the bastard deserved it, would wreck Dean in ways no one could fix. Would fuck him up in the head for years to come.

With that memory came another, and more, the moments when Dean had been beaten to a mess of broken bones and open wounds and Cas would heal him—not with a finger the way he’d always done with Sam and Bobby, not with a glowing palm to his chest as he had with others—but affectionately, _lovingly_ , cradling the side of his face with his palms.

Heat pulsed through Dean, same as it did when Cas’ grace knitted every gash and mended every snapped bone. It was probably the alcohol this time.

Looking back to the mirror, he saw a vision of Cas standing behind him. It was a frequent hallucination for Dean, had been happening for years actually. Their eyes met through the mirror and Dean had to brace his hands on the counter, feeling weak. Was the annoying demon right? Was it _just_ that simple?

 _No_ , he thought fiercely. _No, it wasn’t._ He felt the fear, the terror creeping it’s way through his veins. He’d felt an echo of it, long long ago with Lisa. A faint echo, with Ben too. A singular truth racing around his mind, _if I love you, you die._

Startling him, the vision moved, inching closer. Dean closed his eyes, letting the swirl of his inebriation take over. Why fight it.

“I’m here.”

Dean's fingers curled against the granite, his eyes squeezed tighter. Cas’ voice was unmistakable, but the jury was out on whether it was real. Dean didn’t want to know. The hallucinations didn't often speak. In his mind, he prayed, knowing the risk it posed if the vision were just that.

_Go, please just go._

Keeping his eyes shut, he fumbled for the door and made his way across the hall. Over the sounds of his own drunken movements, he would swear he heard a very faint sigh. But, then again, Dean was drunk and half-asleep, and probably partially insane.


	10. Chapter 10

To Dean’s severe dismay, the whole gang stuck around with no indication they were taking off anytime soon. Dean kept his distance. His desire for Cas was getting out of hand, so much so that he found himself standing in Rye’s room.

“Stop giving me that look.”

Rye smirked. “What look? This is my face.”

“Do you have what I want or not?”

The demon huffed and rolled his eyes, he went over to his own dresser and dug through some drawers. After a few minutes of fruitless rummaging, he turned to Dean, “No weed. But I do have lube and many dildos. Cas is down the hall from your room. FYI.”

“Well then how about _you_ give yourself a grand ol’ time and tell me where I can get what I want.” Dean paced and rubbed the back of his neck. Once more, he felt a prickle of sadness for the other man. “Listen, I’m sorry my choices piss you off.”

“They do.”

“I’m aware. But things aren’t that easy, okay. Nothing is. I mean, shit, look at what’s going on around you. There’s a baby growing as we speak whose father is the damned devil. You think I have issues, trust me, that kid’s gonna need some mad therapy.”

“He.”

“What?”

Rye’s expression turned soft, making him appear young. “The baby, we’re pretty sure it’s a boy.”

Huh. “Bouncing baby boy, eh.”

“Yeah,” he smiled. They shared a muted laugh at the absurdity of the conversation, but then Rye turned serious, something Dean thought to be impossible. “You don’t think I haven’t watched the same fear claim my own family,” he remarked. “They’re immortal. If they fall in love with a human, it doesn’t matter how perfect their life together is, they will always lose.”

“This is a terrible speech if you’re trying to convince me.” He turned the words over, and said, “And besides, how do you even know that’s the issue?”

“Please.” Rye screwed up the side of his face and walked over. “Doesn’t matter anyway, right. And if you want pot, or any other downer, upper, what-have-you, go see Meg. She’s always enjoyed a non-alcoholic kind of party. Always says booze hits a person too hard.”

She wasn’t wrong, thought Dean. He left Rye to do whatever it was he did on his own and meandered the halls until he found Meg’s room, the one she shared with Gray. A moments apprehension stilled his raised fist, because he hadn’t interacted with Grayson much yet. Not that Dean was worried, but the man had a wide face, wider shoulders, and a severe disposition.

Sucking back his nerves, Dean rapped on the door. Heavyset footsteps thumped towards the door and it was yanked open.

“Oh,” Dean stammered, absorbing the site of a sweaty, half-naked man who seemed to ooze aggression. “Am I, uhh, interrupting?”

“Yes.” Despite the deeply black tone of his skin, the flush on his cheeks and across his chest was clear. Dean swallowed and studiously did not think of what this demon and Meg may have been doing.

“Right. Of course, look, um, Rye mentioned Meg might have some pot…” Grayson’s chestnut eyes narrowed on Dean, his jaw flexing in a very _as-if-you-fucking-interrupted-me-for-this_ sort of way. “Or I can just come back later—” Dean spun in the opposite direction and was ready to hightail it down the hall until a thick hand clamped on his shoulder.

“Wait.”

Nervously, he turned back, shifty on his feet and feeling mad awkward. Grayson ducked back into the room and Dean caught the low murmuring of an exchange but couldn’t make out the words.

When he returned, he was carrying a freezer ziplock bag packed to the brim with weed. Dean had never seen that much pot in his life. He felt his eyes widen. My god, bring on the endless nights of hazy goodtimes.

“Damn,” he exclaimed, reaching out for it—

The demon held it back. “Any more interruptions and we’ll make a game out of seeing how far I can throw you.”

Yikes. “Got it.”

The giant bag was pushed into his chest and the door slammed in his face. He nodded to himself and muttered, “Alright then... that was special.” As he sauntered back down the hall, quite excited about his nightly plans, he caught the faintest sound of a _smack-smack-smack_ and a very low shriek. Needless to say, he started speed-walking.

Hours later, he found himself outside with Sam walking around the perimeter of the house. It was a breezy, cool night and they were sharing a joint. Dean was sure they’ve never done that and it was such a brotherly thing to do, really.

Sam, of course, was the giggly type. “And, and,” Sammy stuttered, the fits rolling through him, “Remember that time dad came home all pissed off about some hunt, and”—Sam started to quiver again with laughter—“and he tried to open the chip-bag and fought with it and ripped the whole bag open and there were chips _everywhere!_ ” Dean watched his brother, cheeks red as he nearly tripped on his own feet laughing so hard. “I mean, chips were in the bed, on the floor, in our bags. And, w-we didn’t want to laugh because he was still mad, but it was so fuuuuucking hilarious!”

Dean smiled, pulling the joint to his lips. “And we laughed anyway.”

“Yeah.” His brother sighed. “Dad did too though.”

“Figured he was either gonna laugh or smack us.”

Sam was quiet, deflated by the sharp reminder of their father’s parenting skills. He took the half-done joint from Dean and sucked it in, both of them watching the exhale of smoke swirl and disappear against the night.

“I think we should stay here,” said Sam.

Dean looked to his brother and seized the smoke from his fingers. “Why?”

“Because, as ridiculous as it is, I like these guys. We need more allies Dean. It’s one thing I sort of admire about mom. We’ve been doing this on our own so long… I forgot we didn’t have to.”

“Not sure I’d put a whole lot of faith in mom’s decision-making skills.”

“Dean,” Sam chastised. “Working with other hunters—not those British jerks—but actual hunters isn’t something you can put her down for. That’s a _good_ thing,” he added slowly, as if Dean were stupid.

“Yeah, and you know what Sammy, we used to work with hunters - you remember that? Bobby, Rufus, Grampa, Jo, Ellen… should I keep going?”

Pushing out his chin, Sam shot him a look and took back the weed to finish it off. “You want to swear everyone off then? No more friends, no more allies, no mom, no _Cas—_ ” Sam cut the word a certain way, acknowledging how very different Cas was than the rest. He took another hit and carried on, “Where does it end? What about me?”

Shaking his head, avoiding Sam’s imploring hazel eyes, Dean muttered, “Don’t be stupid.”

“I’m not the stupid one here. Hunting alone, all this time like we’ve done, Dean—it’s insane. You know, I used to get it, why you pushed everyone else away and I was okay with it because I knew you would never do that to me. But I never thought you’d do it to Cas either, and you are. That’s why you volunteered to be here, and why you don’t want us to stay.”

His baby brother was annoying, but he wasn’t wrong. “We should go inside.”

Sam huffed, bending over to snuff the bud out on the damp grass. “Having allies, friends… lovers... Dean, we _need_ that.”

“You do. I don’t.”

“Bullshit.”

Dean eyed his brother as they crossed the lawn back to the house, annoyed by his resilience and bravery. Reaching a stalemate in the argument, they were silent. He would never admit it, but Sam was right. Hunting probably would be better with friends, allies, a lover to spend the nights with.

But the problem was the transient nature of it all. Happiness had an expiry date, and Dean would rather not buy into it just to have it all go sour on him.

It reminded Dean of a mug his dad used to be fond of, before all Hell had broken loose to destroy Dean and his family. It was a ceramic mug, oddly shaped and very unbalanced. Dean had made it when he was around three with the help of his mom. Because of it’s poor construction, it broke all the time. Dad would fix it up, keep using it… all the while knowing it would break again. One day, Dean busted it by accident. Instead of telling his dad, he scooped up the pieces and dumped them in the trash. Why fix something that would break again? And for that matter, why had Dean’s mother allowed him to create something so fragile. It was stupid.

Dean left his baby brother to his own devices when they got back to the subbase levels, and he took a journey down halls less traveled, hoping to find something to distract himself.

The walls were a smooth beige in the halls, white ornate trim framed everything. Paintings broke up the space, as did open and closed doors along the way. There were rooms for everything, more than one kitchen, several living rooms, a maze of human entertainment and living. Dean knew there was a movie room somewhere, cozy and dark with rows of leather couches. This was his intended destination.

But he got lost, not having been in this direction more than twice. The walking seemed to go on forever and he could only imagine how far the base spread out below the neighbourhood. Hell, maybe it stretched all through downtown Chicago.

Turning down a hall, the space growing wider, he noticed an open set of doors up on the right, flickering yellow light escaping into the corridor. He expected a room with a fire and maybe one of the women cozying up with her man.

Instead, he walked into a library. Not a cold, heartless field of steel racks and uninteresting books but a dark, warm space that dragged him in like a magnet. Heavy wood bookcases rose up maybe four storeys high, the entire space designed in a sweeping arc out from the front wall where the doors were. Narrow walkways on various levels offered access and reading niches. On the main floor there were oversized furniture pieces placed in a haphazard way, couches and chairs and what looked like a daybed. On the opposite wall, at the apex of the arc, there was a fireplace, though calling it a fireplace didn’t do it justice. It was almost a room in and of itself. Without a fire roaring inside, a full grown man could walk into it and not have to duck or even feel cramped.

Dean had always liked to read, even though Sam seemed to think otherwise. Truth was, he simply didn’t have time for it. Reading for fun was always outranked by research.

Distracted by the grandiose pull of the room, Dean didn’t take notice of the way he was moving through it, ambling without purpose and letting his hands drag over every surface. It was only when he found himself on the other side he realized he wasn’t alone.

A thick, puffy sectional faced the fire, it’s back to the doors explaining how Dean could’ve missed the fact someone was here.

Cas seemed to be asleep. But he was an angel, and maybe he was faking to be kind. Books were in a broken pile past his feet, and his hands were pressed palm-to-palm beneath his face, the light of the fire flickering over his cheeks and eyelids.

Subconsciously holding himself at bay, Dean shoved his hands into his pockets and felt his expression twist into something cruel. Anger was often his default, anything else felt like a slippery slope of emotion.

Whether Cas was awake or not, he didn’t care. This was one of those rare moments. They were alone, Dean was blessedly high as a kite and felt comfortable enough (in control enough) to memorize the image.

The heat in the room was no doubt the reason Cas had removed his jacket, where it was now folded neatly on the floor. His shirt sleeves were rumpled, the cuffs unbuttoned. The collar turned up and pressed flat against Cas’ neck, the crisp corner tucked under his jaw. Whether it was the fire, or a trick of the lighting, Cas’ skin seemed radiant against the white dress-shirt—not just tanned but glowing. Dark lashes fanned out against the rise of his cheek, and for once, he didn’t seem as tired as he always did. There wasn’t a trace of the circles he often had.

Dean used to be concerned about that. How could an angel be so exhausted? But Cas had explained to him once that the more he immersed himself with humans, the more he succumbed to our laws of physics the more his body reacted in human ways. He could tap into his grace, if he desired, but often forgot.

He’d get tired, but refused to rest. Would be hungry, but give Dean his plate.

All at once, the heat from the fire was too much against his back, making sweat trickle down his spine and so he stepped away from it… closer to Castiel.

Drowning in the haze of good weed he didn’t feel strained or restless as he had around Cas lately, he just felt…

Alone.

He was tired, he realized, finding the effort to stand more annoying than it was worth. Without thinking, he sank to his knees in front of the couch, continuing this terribly creepster moment. He kept being drawn back to the way Cas’ shirt collar was awkwardly tucked under his chin, imagined it would be pretty damn irritating.

Sighing, he reached forward—hovering close enough to feel body heat—and gently fixed the shirt, lingering afterward.

Cas’ eyes flicked open, the sudden attention freezing Dean in place. His hand rested motionless on Cas’ collarbone.

He couldn’t move. Potent need clamped around him like a vice, his fear straining to overcome it.

Cas spoke first, his voice gravelly like static. “You’re only at war with yourself.”

It was the most blatant acknowledgement of their non-relationship ever verbalized. Dean huffed, dropping his gaze to the rope of trim on the edge of the cushion. “That,” he said shakily, “… and horrific probability.”

He pulled his hand back and rubbed his face, flustered under the unwavering power of Cas’ attention.

“Dean.” It wasn’t a soft-spoken utterance of his name, but a command.

When he looked up, reluctantly meeting Cas’ sharp blue eyes, he was nearly overcome with the urge to climb on the couch and curl up against the angel. But the fear and future grief stilled him.

“What?”

“We’ve never…” Cas looked away then. “All this time and neither of us have said anything.”

At a loss for words, Dean shrugged. “Nothin’ to say.”

“There is.”

This was most definitely a conversation Dean couldn’t handle; he needed distance. He shook his head in a choppy, uncertain movement and got to his feet. His knees could barely hold him up.

Keeping his eyes on the doors ahead and nothing else, he left.

As he moved down the hall in a cloud of emotion, he felt broken. Each step unnatural and carrying him away from what he wanted most.

At the first open room, he found a phone and dialed four.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, there is some minor tension between Dean and Rye, but no action. And because I couldn't post on Wednesday, I am posting two chapters today. Enjoy the long weekend guys, love yas xoxoxo

Nerves frayed as shit, Dean got to Rye’s room and didn’t bother to knock. The demon was lounging on the bed eyes glazed and binging Netflix, clueless to Dean’s state of mind. 

Without saying a word in advance, Dean yanked his long-sleeve shirt over his head in a single fluid motion. He stared at his newfound friend, chest heaving with doubt. 

And yet, his intent was clear. 

It’s amazing how far a man falls when he accepts he’s an asshole. This was not where he should be, but he needed to feel  _ something _ . Something far less nuclear than how he felt around Cas. 

Besides, there was nowhere else for him that really made sense. 

Rye’s bicoloured eyes met Dean’s inflamed stare and he said nothing. Reaching out without breaking the sudden intensity, Rye grabbed the controller and turned off the tv. 

Though the tv hadn’t been loud, the following crisp silence was swollen, reaching into the far corners of the room. It would be the right time for him to make a move, to walk forward and climb onto the bed. Dean couldn’t bring himself to move a finger, let alone his whole goddamn leg. 

He’d gotten this far, only to be frozen by some insufferable emo paralysis. It was a joke. He couldn’t even act out the way he needed. What kind of bull shit was this? 

“Hey,” Rye spoke, his voice soft even against the dead quiet. 

Dean didn’t bother to look up, he knew he’d find pity. “Raced all the way here just to run outta gas,” he chuckled awkwardly. 

From the corner of his eye, he watched Rye slide off the bed to the side, his lithe muscular frame moving to the closet and grabbing something from it. He came over to Dean and nudged his arm, forcing Dean to turn to the left. 

His friend’s face was a mix of concern and… restraint. “We could…” Dean let the sentence hang, his confidence failing it. He shrugged. 

Rye cocked his head, a commiserating smirk pulling his lips. “Oh yes, we could. And maybe we will… The Devil knows I want to.” He sighed, arranging the sweater in his arms—reaching up to cram it over Dean’s head. “But you look less in the mood for fucking and more in the mood to space out. Am I right?”

Dean huffed, shoving his arms through the holes of the sweater, knowing it was a shade too tight over his cushiony physique. “If I were on my game, you’d be on your hands and knees right now.” It was meant to come off as a threat, but it was too gentle-sounding, too sweet. 

“Psssh. You callin’ this ass easy? Please. I’d make you work for it.”

“Rye. First day you met me, you propositioned riding me for basically eight solid months.”

“That may be true, my sexy hunter friend. But the times have changed.”

“That times?” snorted Dean. “That was, like, two weeks ago.”

“Whatever.  _ No ass for you! _ ” Rye barked in a Russian accent, making Dean think of an old Seinfeld episode. 

Standing at the end of the bed, Dean felt a thread of rejection mingle with all his guilt. Not exactly a pleasant emotion. Didn’t he used to be a confident, fun-loving guy? Where the hell had that bastard gone?

Dean figured every death he’d suffered, Bobby, Dad, Ellen, Jo, etc, each one chipped away at his good vibrations until he was nothing but a beating chest of grave acceptance. Sometimes he could even hide it from himself, believe the lie for a moment when he was laughing with Sammy, or had fallen into the monotonous drone of a late night drive. 

No such luck now. 

“What now?” he asked.

Rye grabbed the back of his neck and drew him close, their eyes meeting in the shadow. “We gon’fuckin’ smoke, yo,” and then he grinned, the way a demon should. Dean wasn’t in the least afraid. 

 

“That is one big motherfucker of a dubbie.”

Dean chuckled, taking a swig of JD. He was lying stretched out on the loveseat in Rye’s room. On the bed, his demon friend was admiring Dean’s handiwork. And that it was. Most definitely the fattest fattie ever. 

That, plus the booze, was doing an excellent job of erasing Dean’s short-term memory. In fact, he was feeling so artificially carefree that he started to hum random tunes that popped into his mind. 

Rye asked, “You sing?”

Shrugging, he kept his eyes on the ceiling and replied, “Meh, sometimes. Mostly to annoy my brother,” he huffed a laugh, “but if I’m alone, yeah. Used to play some guitar way back when, but it’s been—” he closed his mouth and thought back, only making out a vague memory of plucking strings in his twenties. He’d been on a hunt, he thought, alone. It had been a way to pass the time. “Fuck,” he cursed. “It’s been over a decade.”

“We have a room somewhere with some musical instruments, if you’re interested.”

_ Of course you do _ , he thought. “What  _ don’t _ you guys have?”

Rye didn’t laugh, or throw out some off-colour joke. He sighed and lit the smoke. “Any interaction with the outside world.”

It was hard to imagine how or why they did it, cutting themselves out of society. But in a lot of ways, he understood. 

They were quiet for a while. Rye put on some dumb TV show and they zoned out, trading booze and smoking the big fattie until both their eyes were bloodshot and Dean was starting to realize how heavily he was relying on other addictions to put Cas out of his mind. It was getting out of hand. 

If Mick or Ketch and their buddies showed up, if Crowley and his horde came for Kelly… or any other calamitous development sprung up, he wouldn’t be able to fight worth a damn. Dean angrily put the JD aside, snubbed out the joint and sat up. The world spun, but he held onto the sensation, letting it remind him of his own fucking stupidity. 

Christ, he should’ve just done the do with Rye. At least his head wouldn’t be swimming. 

If his own problems ever resulted in something happening to Sam… or Cas. Jesus Christ. Everything he ever feared would be realized, no matter his decisions or attempts to avoid it. He needed a better system. And fast. 

“Why do you look like you’re doing advanced calculus?”

Dean looked over to see Rye staring at him, one eyebrow arched. “I need help.”

“That’s obvious.”

“Seriously, man. I can’t keep doing this.” He gestured to the side table and it’s empty glasses, bottles, and wasted butts. A final wave, shakily, towards Rye. “What do I do? I could talk to Sam, but I already know what he’s gonna say and we’ve been around that argument a dozen times and...” Dean gave up on the sentence, as it was going nowhere anyway. 

“Let me ask you something, if you were blind and someone was murdered in front of you—how would you know?”

Confused, but playing along, Dean ventured an answer, “Umm. Sound, the conversation…”

“No one has said anything,” adds Rye. 

Again, he shrugged. “I don’t know. What are you getting at, man?”

“Dude, you’re gonna break, or…” he paused, not saying it. “Or you’ll go off to find a harder fix and that ain’t good for anybody. So just… close your eyes and fucking pray.”

There was no way this fucker was suggesting Dean pray his fears away to God. And besides, how would that go!  _ Um, Dear Chuck: I’m having a hard time controlling how badly I want your son Castiel to fuck me and love me and not die on me. Care to lend a hand? _

Yeah, no thanks. He laughed just imagining it. “I think I’ll pass. I’ve met God, and I don’t think he’d appreciate it, trust me.”

Rye quickly shook his head. “No, no, no. That’s not what I meant. I mean, like… if you don’t see anything, if you don’t hear anything, you're limiting your sensory interpretation of what’s real. If only one out of five senses knows a truth, you can absorb something that terrifies you in manageable pieces.”

Screwing up his face, Dean leaned forward and gave Rye a hard, bewildered stare. “Sorry, say that again.” 

“Think of it like this, you’re afraid of spiders—”

“—I’m not.”

“—and you want to overcome that fear. You don’t just lay naked, eyes wide open, and let a thousand tarantulas crawl over you. You open your hands, close your motherfucking eyes and let someone place a single spider in your palm, cringe and bear it.”

Dean should not be this high for a conversation like this. His dreams were going to be goddamn terrifying. “Man, none of this sounds like something I want right now.”

Rye huffed and bolted from the bed, coming to stand aggressively in front of Dean. “What I’m saying is, you need Cas. Not booze, or weed, or… me. But you’re all fucked in the head by some ridiculous fear that being with him will be so potent and consuming that you know losing him would kill you. Did I miss anything in my stellar assessment?”

Dean numbly shook his head. “Why are you doing this… why are you so invested in my love life, or lack thereof.”

The demon’s eyes flared red, and Dean was coldly reminded who his new friend was. “Because I refuse to watch two idiots be idiots under my own fucking roof!” his voice carrying loudly towards the end. 

Feeling backed into a corner, almost physically so, he thought over what Rye had suggested. “You’re saying I should let Cas… that we should, ya know, whatever. And I would just be there, with my fucking eyes closed and mute?!” Self-hatred flared like a beast. “I would never do that to Cas. I owe him more than that.”

“Well duh. But you’re a big ol’ bucket of chicken shit my friend. You gotta ease into it. And besides, he’s stronger than you think. If anything, seeing you like this is hurting him worse anyway.”

“I doubt that.”

“Well I’m older than you so… suck it, I’m right.” To emphasize the point, he X’d his arms across his junk and humped it.

“Yes, older and  _ so _ mature,” Dean muttered sarcastically. 

Rye straightened his stance, the long-sleeve shirt he now wore was tight around his arms and chest. He was more imposing than Dean had seen before. 

Apparently people shitting all over their own love lives was a grievous act to the guy, and sure, Dean had compassion for where the anger stemmed from. It made sense, but badgering someone to do something was different than doing it yourself. And as far as Dean knew, Rye had zero experience with relationships so he should probably stop shoveling his advice around as if it was worth anything. 

The contempt must have come across in his face, because Rye spat the next word, “What?”

“Forget it. You wouldn’t understand.”

The demon sneered. There was a sharp beat of silence. “Fuck you. Get out of my room.”

_ Awesome.  _

Leave it to Dean to alienate the one new friend he’s had in the better part of a dozen years, but hey, that was the way it went sometimes. He raised his hands in surrender as he got up, and quietly left the room. 


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Extra chapter for ya's. AND FINALLY we have some Cas / Dean action!!!! #dry-humping because I'm such a fucking nerd. But then some, uh, wet-humping??? You'll see lol. Also some slight dom/sub undertones here just fyi.

Back in his room, it was well past two a.m. and he couldn’t sleep. Despite all his best efforts, he couldn’t shake Rye’s suggestion.

Castiel was tethered to him, and no amount of drugs and alcohol had frayed the connection. It only managed to blur the line, and not even all that well.

Slowly, Dean was breaking inside. He could feel it, the fissures spreading like a spiderweb through his soul. Dean did not love easily, but when he did it consumed him. He’d known this about himself for a long time, and found ways to keep his distance.

The emotion was a cancer, as far as he saw it. It didn’t make him weak, no, it made him powerful. _Destructive_. None of that was good, he’d seen what broken love does to people. Shit, half the cases they worked didn’t boil down to hatred, it was about the loss of love, or the betrayal of a loved one, or some derivative therein.

But if he could just keep love out of it. If he could silo his relationship with Cas, construct it in such a way that intimacy was eliminated, softness eradicated, and every other trapping of being in love surgically eviscerated. Then maybe, _maybe_ he could walk the line of this addiction without killing himself by avoiding it altogether.

The stupid suggestion was now a budding seed in his mind, and he fantasized how it might progress. How one open prayer in the dark would lead to touch… Simple but gratifying. Cas’ fingers on Dean’s skin, that’s it. God, the desire for it raked through him, the need becoming vicious and determined.

No words, no soft-spoken declarations. No lingering lust-filled gazes traded amidst the slapping of their bodies.

Just touch, nothing else. Being fulfilled without becoming vulnerable. It was a joke, okay, he fucking knew that. He was a coward, an insensitive dick. But… he was trapped and he was losing his mind.

It helped that they weren’t at the bunker. Being somewhere different meant he could further separate his downslide from reality. It would all be a dream, and maybe, when all this Pregnant Kelly stuff was over, he could move forward from the addiction, let Cas go in the way he deserved.

Probably not. But hey, it was possible, right? Lesser miracles have gone down.

Dean felt a tremor overtake his muscles as the suggestion no longer felt like a suggestion but a decision already made. All he had to do was… close his eyes.

_And pray._

Fuck, the pace of his breaths doubled and his heart-rate jacked up. Could he even do this? Or would the self-loathing make him a monster afterward? Could he do this to Cas? More importantly, what was the alternative?

Smoke, Drink, Fuck, and Repeat? _No._

He repeated the thought: _Close your eyes. Pray._ And again, Rye’s voice now: Close your eyes and fucking pray. Dean heard Cas’ voice, gruff and resonating repeating the same. It swirled around in his head like liquid down a funnel toward his mouth.

Dean closed his eyes.

And he prayed: _Please_.

No other words came to mind, but he let his desire filter through, feeding it through the open connection. Though that wasn’t the only thing he let crossover to Cas’ mind, he sent flashes of images, spastic details—clear on his plan to deprive his senses of the truth. Guilt, too, threaded through the prayer, but need was thicker than all of it. A tornado on top of a fan.

He couldn’t bring himself to think a word more, nothing clear. Everything just tumbling and abstract. Dean buried his face against the pillow, eyes squeezed tight, and tried to fight the rise of adrenaline. All it did was uselessly cramp his muscles and he’d rather not—

The door creaked open.

All the air rushed free of his lungs and he almost couldn’t bear to take another breath. Knowing the prayer was open, feeling it out the way a phone connection absent of voice still has static, he replayed everything, all of it mixed and tangled and left the next move in Cas’ hands.

 _Ugh,_ he nearly groaned aloud... _Cas’ hands._ He wanted them on his skin.

Even without his sight, Dean _felt_ Castiel’s fierce apprehension rolling through the room. This was crossing a line, and he knew it. He covered his head with his arms, hating himself but waited anyway.

There was a creak, a rustle of movement. Like thunder in the stale silence. His heart was now beating wildly in his throat and he nearly choked on a heartattack when the blanket started slipping away. Cool air snaked over his skin, but it did nothing to calm the growing inferno he had going on inside.

Christ, he was going to be sweating buckets before anything began. He swallowed but his throat was dry and there was no relief.

He felt the edge of the comforter slide over the swell of his ass and he cursed internally at having gone to bed naked, because now he was being gradually exposed. There would be no slow progression into this, just straight-up naked and ready.

Dean heard the fwump of the heavy comforter as it was dropped on the floor. The sound alone carried such sweeping implications he debated hightailing it cartoon-style right out of the room. Instead he was trapped by his own need.

Waiting was the worst part. The hardest stretch of time he’d ever endured. Worse, somehow, than all of his years in hell.

After accepting what he thought was the slow rise of rejection, Dean felt the faintest brush of a finger trace over the length of his calf.

Dean felt paralyzed. Baited by a single sensation. It stopped at the back of his knee and he knew Cas considered whether to leave right then and there. In fact, Dean wondered if the prayer wasn’t as one-directional as he’d always believed.

But, for reasons Dean might never know, Castiel continued. He traced the contours of Dean’s body, endlessly. Dean’s sense of time having flown out the window the moment he hit the call button on his prayer line.

Each pass of Cas’ fingers, down his spine, over his curves, or to the tips of his fingers, he felt the invisible history of the path Cas had taken; his skin tingling in a series of sensory highways.

When it finally ended, he thought: _This is it. Cas is going to leave me now._  

But he didn’t. The bed dipped abruptly with Cas’ weight, two strong hands gripped Dean by the hips, fingers clawed into his flesh, and yanked him to his hands and knees.

“ _Hmm-ngh,_ ” he choked on a gasp, but said nothing. It was the first moment he realized he was hard, cock hanging heavy from his hips. In all the darkness, all the quiet, Dean felt the nuance of things he’d otherwise miss. How tight his nipples felt, how hot his back was, the sweaty dampness at the centre of his chest and between his legs. Insecurity, and embarrassment prompted tremors he failed to control.

Having no way of knowing Cas’ next move, his anxious energy grew. But he wouldn’t dare move. Patience was his only offering. Losing this moment would be worse than being abandoned in this desperate state. Nothing mattered except the feel of Cas’ firms hands on him, pressing hard. And finally, _finally_ , leaving his hips.

Cas’ palms traveled up his spine and down, kneading his skin. It felt less passionate and more frustrated, angry.

 _Good_ , he thought, _be angry._

Cas shifted his weight, the bed dipping and springing back at random. The angel’s warm hands slid back to his hips, where his fingers tightened to dig at his flesh.

He jerked Dean backwards, hard, his backside crashing against Cas’ pelvis. One sheer moment of bliss, followed by the swooping disappointment of realizing Cas was still wearing underwear.

The letdown was short-lived. In seconds, Cas was grinding against him; hard against soft. Nails raking over his skin. The angel working out his palpable aggression at Dean’s cowardice.

In the midst of being grinded into, Dean heard rapid intakes of breath and in those short breaks of silence, he knew the full reality of what this was and almost couldn't take it.

Cas was here, with him. _Touching him._ There was no escaping the truth of it.

Castiel must’ve caught the moment, sensed his fear, because the angel instantly changed gears. Crowding over Dean, he slipped an arm around his damp chest and pulled Dean upright, his back aligning with Cas’ front. Skin-to-skin.

 _Mmngh._ Relief softened Dean's muscles, his rigid sex contradicting his body, kicking in vain.  

He kept as still as he could, feeling Castiel palm the length of his torso and down over his strained thighs. _Ugh, fuck..._ On the blazing return trip, Cas detoured to the inside of his thighs, nudging his knees apart before sliding back up over his balls and stiff cock but not lingering long enough for Dean to clearly remember the seconds’ touch. He wanted to scream.

Pointedly, Cas covered his mouth. An undeniable presence reminding Dean he was there, yet also silencing him, and torturously reminding him of another moment long ago. In an ornately decorated room under bright lights, where they’d been fighting. It had been the end of the world; naturally _._

This was a fight too, he decided.

Cas’ hand was tight against his jaw but Dean had no complaints. The angel’s free arm slung around his waist and pulled him firmly back. Keeping him bound in place, Cas started to grind against him, cloth against skin. He felt Cas’ full length rub along the crease of his ass, the chafing of the fabric building up to uncomfortable but he didn’t care because, while this might’ve been Dean’s insane addiction, it was Cas who called the shots tonight.

Wrapped up in the iron strength of Cas’ arms, Dean relaxed into the strange deliverance of constraint.

He let his head fall back, eyes closed to the world. When he did that, his best friend gasped in blatant desire, tucking his stubbled chin and face towards Dean’s neck… his free hand moving to take Dean in hand, beginning to stroke him slowly.

Overwhelmed, Dean skipped a breath, his chest failing to rise at the sensation of Cas’ fingers closing around his stiff erection, sliding up and down, a loose twist, tightening at random. Moving faster and then slower, killing him.

Trying to fight the swirl of pleasure, Dean focused on the humid breath against his throat. It was faint, but Dean could feel the brush of Cas’ lips against his skin. The tease of an open mouth exhaling over the pounding of his pulse.

It was hard to maintain any sense of composure, to stay upright. Heatwaves of pleasure coursed through him, from the warm recurring pull of movement on his cock to the moist gasps wetting his neck, and finally, to the tease of the angel’s rough, unsatisfying, thrusts.

Dean wanted more, and he was willing. Hell, he would suffer pain for it if a lack of resources was the problem. But it wasn’t like he was going to beg. He’d already asked too much of his friend.

So he endured, savouring every touch; crying inside for more.

 

Long after Dean lost control of his breath, when he could only feel his body reacting to Cas’ unyielding hold and rolling thrusts, the mood of their nighttime collision took a sharp turn. Cas’ grip wrenched tight over Dean’s jaw, the angels hips drove hard against his backside, as if he were fighting the fact they were separate entities. Dean knew Cas was close, and he wondered how this delirious moment would end.

Cas’ squeezed around his shaft, making Dean pant for air through his nose. Then the tight hold on his cock was gone. A rush of movement behind him, followed by the snap of an elastic.

 _Fuck._ He pleaded with his soul, wondering if Cas would—

 _Ahh fuuuckin' Christ._ The blazing heat of Cas’ thick cock and hard hips pressed hard against Dean’s ass, grinding ever so slightly. But it was clear in that moment there was going to be no penetration. No words were needed, he sensed the boundary Cas refused to cross. That was fine, so long as he had this. Whatever the hell this was, exactly.

Cas’ fist wrapped around his sex again and started to fly over his shaft, jerking him with purpose, pumping his pleasure to a breaking point. Arousal speared through him, an orgasm building from the base of his spine. Dean strained for air, not getting nearly enough. He wanted to gasp, cry out, scream profanities at will. Instead he felt Cas slip into his mind, finding a way to calm his sudden panic.

 _You’re okay,_ he heard Cas’ voice, unsure of whether it was there or not.

Whatever finesse Cas had started with, it was was falling to the wayside. The angel worked Dean over, rolling his hips and hot erection awkwardly against Dean; skin plastered to skin. Each erratic movement serving to part his ass a little more and a little more until Cas managed to wedge his cock perfectly between Dean’s cheeks, friction teasing his entrance. Rubbing, taunting him. 

A hard moan escaped against his will, muffled by Cas’ palm.

Dean was sweating now, a lot. Cas seemed to be too. Everywhere their skin met, colliding in clumsy necessity, it was slick, making the wild movements below slightly terrifying. Not that he was necessarily worried about Cas ramming into him by accident, or the pain of that unprepped, but more his own emotional unpreparedness for that degree of intimacy.

As bad he wanted it, he couldn’t handle being loved by Cas in such a raw, unadulterated act, reminding him of a normalcy they’d never have.

Cas bit him, a sharp pointed distraction. _Ugh, fuuuuck._ Shivers raced down his spine, tears springing to his eyes. He felt Cas’ breath as the angel sucked against the place his teeth had pinched.

At the centre of Dean’s hips, Castiel’s hand slowed, chaos settling, as he fisted gently over Dean’s weeping sex in such a way that Dean couldn’t take it. It was too slow and too _loving_.

Dean’s heart hammered against his ribcage in protest, but it was too late; he was already careening over the edge.

His ragged scream blasted near soundlessly against Cas’ hand and Dean jerked through his orgasm in the confines of the angel’s unrelenting hold. Come shot out of him in blissful surges of euphoria, some of it working through Cas’ fingers where it slid down to his balls, dripping down his damp, shaking thighs.

As he started to curl forward, trembling, from the sex or a blaze of anger at himself, Cas released Dean’s wilting erection and wrapped his arm around Dean’s middle, holding him tight as he sought his own release.  

Small huffs of exertion slipped past Cas’ lips, becoming louder and louder at the hollow of Dean’s ear.

Pinned in place, he felt every strain of muscle, every twitch, and the rush of every hard breath as Cas lost himself in the moment. And then the angel went still, a long guttural moan rose in the silence as Cas started to come, his hips jerking slightly, warm release filling up between Dean’s asscheeks, sliding over the curves of his flesh. Some of it smearing against his hole.

He couldn’t handle it, his body shook and he wanted more. He _needed_ more. Desperation roared inside him; a bonafide Cas-addict now, without a doubt in his mind. He would _always_ crave Cas, deep in his marrow.

_Cas..._

As the angel slowly came down from his high, Dean struggled to shift and reach back, needing to wrap his arms around his best friend, to be sure he was there and not some crazy mirage. He felt restless despite his release.

Castiel denied him, grunting against his efforts and grabbed his wrists, locking his arms in place over his chest. With his mouth now free, Dean was gasping and nearly wheezing. Cas shushed him, saying nothing else. For a dragging ten minutes, Cas held Dean this way. Come cooled against their skin in that time and became itchy.

But his breathing slowed, eventually. His heartrate too.

Then, slowly, as if Dean were a wild creature he was letting go at the edge of a forest, Castiel retracted his hands and shuffled back.

Dean immediately dove forward, trying to bury himself against the mattress and needing, _needing,_ the blankets to cover himself. _Please…_ he thought, tormented by his lack of courage.

The soft covers appeared from nowhere, draping over his naked body. As if it all had never happened. Dean didn’t hear Cas leave the room. He really hoped he would sleep after he’d caved to this addiction, but instead he cried because, fucking hell, he was _such_ an asshole.

“Fuckin hell,” he rasped, his expression twisted with anguish, “what’s wrong with me?”

After punching the pillow until he was tired, and crying some more even then, Dean eventually passed out. His body curled on one side of the bed, arms wrapped around a bundle of pillows.

His last thought, before falling unconscious, was fearing tonight was the first, and last time, he would ever be with Cas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did that feel good or what?! I mean, painful yes... poor Dean. Poor Cas. But yum. 
> 
> And BTW more porn to come in the next chapter, a little more angst but only like a couple chapters I swear before Dean caves to finally let himself be with Cas, and for those of you who love Rye, I am totally writing a separate one-shot story from this of just Dean and Rye getting it on. For my own pleasure, and hopefully... for yours too haha.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting two today cause i love you guys. :) Please let me know if there are any mistakes. Thx <3

It seemed impossible to feel anything but guilt and pain, but Dean woke the next morning feeling sane for the first time in weeks. The constant itch under his skin gone, the weight in his chest nowhere near as heavy as it had been. 

There was no rational explanation for it. Somehow, crossing that boundary with Cas—however horribly he’d done it—calmed the storm in his soul he’d been fighting for years. 

What was the strangest part of it all was the stark lack of evidence from the night before. Dean was sure he’d fallen asleep alone, and pretty damn filthy at that. But now, the sheets were soft and unrumpled beneath him, his skin smooth, not a single inch caked in dried come. 

Had Cas somehow magically scrubbed him clean in the night? And when? Had all of it been a trippy vivid dream? Some byproduct of an unknown additive in the weed.

“Don’t you look satisfied.”

_ Fuck! _ Dean scrambled into a sitting position, piling the blankets over his junk and exposing his feet in the process, glaring at the uninvited companion sitting in the corner of the room. 

“Meg,” he grated, “what the hell are you doing in here?!”

She smirked at him. “I was looking for Clarence.”

“Yeah well, he ain’t here.”

Man, Dean wished he were wearing clothes. In fact, this was now the second time she’d cornered him when he was a little short on threads. He didn’t care for it. It was all her design to have the upper hand in all of their interactions, to make him feel as off-kilter as possible.

“Not now obviously. But he was. Saw him slip in here just a couple hours ago.”

_ What? _ “A couple hours ago—what time is it?”

Turned out it was nearing lunch and Cas had explained he was worried about Dean, or that was the excuse he’d given Meg. She didn’t seem convinced. 

“Care to tell me what’s going on between you and my angel.”

The urge to growl, ‘ _ Not YOUR angel,’  _  sat on the tip of his tongue, but he held it back. Valiantly. “Nothing.”

“Liar.”

Knowing it made no difference if he fired back, he kept quiet. Instead he met her eyes, imploring her to get the hell out of his room. 

“Mm-hmm,” she murmured, all too aware of things. “Whatever isn’t or is going on, if you hurt my unicorn,” her voice seethed with baited threat, “I will break every bone you have, wait for you to heal, and then do it all over again.”

He rolled his eyes. “Does your demon husband know you’re still harbouring feelings for Cas? Or for that matter, the desire to torture people?” he sneered. 

She quirked her lip, standing up from the chair. “Don’t bother yourself about my love life, Dean. You’ve got more than enough to worry about for your own.” With that note, she turned to the door and disappeared. 

Alone, naked and harboring fresh guilt, Dean whipped the covers off and stormed to the closet. Dressing was made easy given what was available to him. The freebie clothes were all plain, straight jeans and solid colour shirts in a mix of long and short sleeve. The occasional zip-up sweater, too. White socks and white undershirts. 

Not a single plaid, unfortunately. No top notch suit either. It made him realize how much he appreciated sprucing himself up with a new button-up or jacket. 

The boxers however, were fucking awesome. Every single one a pair of SAXX long briefs. To be honest, much as Dean loved women’s underwear—wearing them probably more often than was normal even for a kink—these were damn nice. There was even a pocket for his nuts. Whoever invented this shit was a genius. No more sticky ballsac plastered to his thigh on hot days. 

Pulling them on, he adjusted himself, lingering longer than necessary as his mind dredged up the memory of the last person who’d touched him there. He thought about the way Cas’ long fingers had wrapped around him. Eyes closing on reflex, the sensations came rushing back in vivid detail. Of course, limited detail—as per Rye’s suggested formula. 

He swallowed, nerves rattled over what he’d done. Christ, he needed to talk to someone. After his last encounter with Rye though, he didn’t think the demon would take too kindly to a half-assed apology, which is all that Dean was good at.    

That left Sam.  _ Shit…  _

Dean buttoned the top of the well-fit jeans and met his expression in the mirror by the door. When had he gotten so old? And worse… when had he become the kind of man who was so choked by fear he would purposely hurt one of the few people left in his life?

Furious, he shook his head. Shame twisted in his gut, cutting off any hint of hunger he had when he’d woken. 

A half hour later, he was outside with Sam; the two of them sitting on top of the exterior stone wall that surrounded the yard. After having asked Sam to join him, he hadn’t said a word since. His brother’s eyes routinely shifted to observe him, contemplative. 

Dean looked out towards the sky, bordered below by the hedge nearby. It was overcast, no wind or rain to give any hope for a clear afternoon. 

“I fucked up,” he lead with. 

To the right, Sam pursed his lips. His brother warred between budding anger and his desire to support Dean in this unprecedented heart-to-heart business. “What happened?” Knowing Dean as he did, Sam focused on his shoes, avoiding contact. It was appreciated. 

Again, Dean gave his head a shake, wanting to erase the shell of the man he’d become. “Cas and I…” he sighed, unable to voice what he’d done. 

“Dean,” admonished Sam. Already, he knew; that much was clear. Maybe he’d known all morning, maybe Cas had gone to him as well. Not that it would shock Dean at all. “God, what the hell are you doing?”

Wincing, he fiddled with a loose thread. “Treading water, man. Treading water.” He shot a look to the right, needing to gauge his brother’s reaction.

Staring ahead, towards the thick greenery, Sam’s mouth was pressed in a flat line, his brows dented in frustration. “Don’t make me give you a lecture, Dean. I already gave mom one. Not that either of you ever listen to me anyway,” he muttered.

Confused, Dean met his hazel eyes. “When was this?”

“This morning. She uh…” Sam pulled a face; he was worried. “She told Ketch.”

“She told Ketch what?!” he demanded. 

“Where we are, where Kelly is…  _ everything _ .”

WIthout thinking, Dean jumped off the wall to the grass. “Fucking Christ Sam, why not lead with the headliner why don’t you?”

Sam copied his descent, arms extended. “Relax. I already told everyone inside and other than being on high alert, there’s nothing we can do. It’s not like we’re going to go after the guy, and if we did—what then? Fight mom? I mean c’mon, Dean.”

Pacing, he couldn’t believe their own mother was going against them. All for what? Some altruistic goal of eradicating evil to make the world a better place for them. “What the fuck is she thinking?”

Sam shrugged. “She’s trying to help… I guess.”

“Right,” he scoffed. “Cause this is helping.”

Trekking back to the front door, Dean felt his brother following behind. By the time they were in the elevator, he knew their earlier conversation wasn’t done. Sam’s arms were crossed, meaning he was in full disapproving mode. 

“You need to set things right with Cas.”

“There is no setting things right,” he admitted. Dean knew his limits; hated them sure, but he knew them. “Anytime I think of…  _ trying, _ ” he swallowed the instant pain, “it haunts me. Terrifies me, and I’m just… fucking paralyzed.”

Leaning back against the wall, watching the last few floors count down, Sam said, “Dude, you know he’s alive and well, right. Here. Within arms reach.”

“I know dumbass, it’s just—”

“—Just that you picture the entire course of you and him together and it all ends in blood and grief, and heartache.”

And destruction. “Yes.”

The elevator doors dinged and opened. “You don’t know that,” Sam argued, his voice hard, his oversized frame blocking the exit.

“Okay,” Dean ventured. “Promise me then. Promise me, right here and now, that my worst fears won’t come true.”

Tall and imposing, Sam kept silent. His only tell was the seconds’ twitch along the side of his jaw.

Dean needed his brother to get it, to  _ really _ understand. “Listen man, I know I’m a jackass for asking, but tell me this, if you could go back in time to the day you met Jess”—his brother’s face crumpled, but Dean had to say it—“to that exact day, and you could decide and whether to continue through with what happened or walk away—What would you do?”

Sam’s response was sharp, “That’s not fair.”

“I know it’s not, Sammy,” he added softly, not wanting to make his point this way but running low on options. “But you need to understand where I’m coming from, man. I can’t, just... turn off the fear. I’m weak, and I’m a coward and an asshole. I know all that. Trust me.”

“And what you’re doing now? That’s the right option?” 

He dropped his eyes to the floor. “No.”

“Dean,” his brother sagged with emotion, “Cas is family to me too, ya know.”

Dean’s response was quiet, “I know.”

“Whatever you have to do to figure this out, fucking do it. Nut up, brother.” Sam shot back, the blend of sympathy and disappointment in his tone a unique contrast. 

When Dean finally lifted his chin, Sam had left. He breathed a short sigh of relief to be alone. Not only was he drowning in guilt, he had his mom to consider and what her actions could mean for this place, and the people in it. One of whom he considered a friend, mostly.

God, why the hell did she trust Ketch the way she did? But then a thought occurred to him, making him blink in disbelief. 

_ Nooo… That can’t be it. _

But the notion persisted, followed by a sudden horrifying image rising in his mind of Ketch and his mother doing unspeakable things. “Oh, God…” Nausea curled in his stomach, anger too. Imagining his mother with anyone but John seemed like yet another slap in the face of their family. 

Fuck. Did she just  _ not _ care? Had she always been this hard-line hunter so easy to abandon her family? 

Vacating the steel-walled elevator, Dean took a left. He needed a drink. Just one.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we go. Dean on his knees, blindfolded. Dean helpless when it comes to Cas. Enjoy :)

After one drink became four, Dean found himself in the library. Of all the pickles that spiced up his life, there was sure to be a book with a solution. Had to be. 

Somewhere, in the vast collection of texts, one of them was sure to bear the title:  _ How Not to be a Shithead _ , or:  _ How to Get Your Mom to Love You _ , or:  _ What to do When the Devil Knocks Someone Up? _

In the entire span of history, there had to be at least one other unlucky bastard to go through this BS already. And you know, maybe have done Dean a solid and fucking wrote about it.

Two hours in, Dead had scanned spine after spine, finding nothing but boring books written by dull nobody’s. He wished the room had windows. Turning his face to the direction of the sky, he closed his eyes and tried to dredge up his feelings from the night before. Not the moments with Cas, but instead the crippling sensation of being stoned and wasted, knowing that his utter uselessness could get his family killed. 

Stupidly, he tried to shake himself alert, tried to expel the emotions that currently crippled him. But he couldn’t. The more he tried, the more he felt like he was missing something. A miner without an axe or a surgeon with alzheimer's.

When he tuned back to the vivid present, he realized his hands were gripping the shelf in front of him, three storeys up on a narrow walkway. His breathing had ramped up and he felt dizzy, uncoordinated. 

Is this what happened when you loved someone enough to kill you? When you lost control of the emotion, it simply poisoned you from the inside. 

“Fuck…”

There was no denying it, he needed Cas the way he needed booze, or pot, or fucking air. All the long year's he spent forticating the necessary distance between them, he’d only been setting himself up for disaster. Good job, Dean. 

Addiction was such a slippery slope. Four hours ago, he felt strong enough to deny himself anything more. What a joke. Now, he was playing devil’s advocate with himself. 

_ You’ve already caved. What’s one more time?  _

Dean gripped the shelf harder, his knuckles straining. 

_ Cas won’t say no to you, he wants you too… _

Every inch of him felt electrified, thrumming with impatience, desire. His lower jaw trembled, the adrenaline pulsing through his veins. Yeah, addictions were a bitch alright. About as much as he was an asshole, at the bare minimum. 

Without permission from his brain, his eyes fell shut. Christ, it hadn’t even been twelve goddamn hours. 

_ Don’t do it, Dean _ , he threatened himself. _ Don’t— _

His lips parted, fire building in the pit of his stomach. This time, he didn’t pray. Not in a tangible sense. If anything about praying could be considered tangible anyway. No, it was more what he’d done day-in and day-out in purgatory. With every fibre of his being, he simply let his emotions explode. Intent running alongside. It wasn’t something Dean had been taught to do, it wasn’t something Cas had ever explained. 

It was like a lot of things about his bond with Castiel, he just knew. As if he could feel Cas maybe the same way the angel felt him. 

Dean knew the moment he was no longer alone. Though, for the life of him, he couldn’t recall any sounds before the small exhale from behind him. Had Cas climbed the ladder? Had he used his wings? 

Did he still  _ have _ wings?

Neither of them moved. The boundless stale silence of the library felt like a heavy blanket blocking his airways. 

“Dean—” Cas’ rough tone was wrecked. 

Capable of only one action, Dean shook his head. Every other joint fused, trapping him in a cage of immobile jackassery. 

The angel’s hands came to rest on either side of his waist. Casual and motionless. Dean felt a thud at the centre of his back, imagining Cas resting his forehead there; the pain no doubt written in the lines of his face.

“This happens my way or not at all,” Castiel voiced stiffly, words resonating against Dean’s spine. When he said nothing at first, incapable of making his throat work, Cas’ tone turned sharp. “Say  _ okay,  _ or  _ yes _ … Anything. Or I will leave you here.”

It took a moment to work up to it, to shatter whatever delusional twist on reality he hoped to keep, but he forced the word out. “Okay.” His consent was gritty, laced with powerless defeat.

After, he heard nothing but the swish of fabric, like the sound of a tie being unlooped. Part of him stirred at the implications. He pictured Cas undressing, how his naked body would look against a backdrop of ancient texts. Dean had no doubt it would be a godly sight.

One he wouldn’t allow himself to have.

He was startled when cool fabric skirted across his forehead, lowering to rest across his eyes. His inhale was sharp, his thighs and hips flexing with a hopeful energy. 

“I know why you can’t look at me,” his angel said, “but that doesn’t mean you can deny me looking at you.”

Heat flared through his chest, a cocktail of nerves and pleasure in an odd balance. The unique sensation of being desired by Cas was unlike anything he’d ever known. He wasn’t worthy, but it felt so goddamn good. 

Cas’ talented hands knotted the tie, securing the blindfold tight around his head and took hold of his hips a second time. In a fluid motion, the angel spun Dean in place so they were face-to-face. Even sightless, it felt too bold. 

_ Too real.  _

With precision clockwork, the terror bloomed. Like spoiled adrenaline.

Same as the night before, Dean had a moment of feeling as though he couldn’t breathe. He pulled at the air, his efforts broken and soft, but didn’t sense the relief of oxygen. Not until Cas’ hands were on him, coaxing his addicted body to work the way it should.

Finally.  _ Relief. _

The warmth of Cas’ palm sank through his t-shirt, creating a trail of memories as he explored Dean a second time in as many days. From his chest, to his collarbone, then worked his way down. 

With every other sexual partner, men and women the same, Dean had never enjoyed having his belly touched. He never knew if this was something to do with past tortures, or his own self-conscious over carrying a few extra pounds, or some other inexplicable vulnerability. 

But now, as he registered the weight and heat of Cas’ hand passing over his ribs, sliding towards his navel, he quivered with an unexpected burst of arousal. Behind his zipper, his cock swelled thick, impeded only by the strength of the borrowed fabric. 

Fuck, how annoyingly quick his body reacted to Cas, giving his desperation away. Goddamn traitorous dick.

For a long minute, Cas’ hands were the only thing he knew. They moved around him, in fluid but calm paths. Tracing patterns up his front, hooking under his arms to slide over and down his back. Cas didn’t touch the way others had; he explored with a kind of novelty. 

It was more than Dean deserved, this fond kindness. 

His best friend stepped closer, Dean knew because he felt breath on his face and intimate warmth radiating against his chest. Both hands caressing him sank to the base of his spine, where they brushed up under his shirt, giving him the skin-on-skin he craved. 

Goosebumps prickled under Cas’ touch. He shivered.  

Acting on this response, Cas pressed into the curve of his back, eradicating the air between them. They collided, his thighs and all the way up. At the last second, he jerked his head to the side. 

_ Fuck.  _ If they kissed, Dean would be lost. Either to his own fear, or to the unhealthy way he’d learned to love someone. Neither were acceptable in his books. 

Castiel’s dry lips crashed, instead, against his throat, balmy and persistent. Dean swallowed his instant pleasure and stumbled back to the bookcase, needing the support to keep his spine from turning to putty. 

He allowed Cas to kiss him. Fuck that, he goddamn  _ relished _ in it. His mind spun in a haze, knees feeling weak, as Cas continued to assault his throat in dragging kisses. But when Cas parted his lips, and Dean felt the slither of his breath, he fell completely still— _ waiting.  _

Cas’ wet tongue crept up the column of his neck and he was a fucking goner. 

An errant moan escaped. Quickly, Dean bit his lip to stop another. He felt Cas’ hands slide over his hips and move back to grab his ass, jerking him forward in a dry, unexpected thrust. Just as he registered the stiff evidence of Cas’ arousal, he felt Cas’ teeth scrape over his pulse. 

_ Christ… _ he wanted more.  _ Needed it.  _

Except this time, if he was going to be a dick, he might as well do it right. A man only asks forgiveness on his knees, right? Reaching blindly in front, he bumped his knuckles against Cas’ flat stomach. The angel’s unique scent bloomed around him as he ventured south. 

While Dean’s fingers worked on a tricky button, Cas pulled away from the path he’d been marking along Dean’s jaw. 

Blue eyes were undoubtedly on him, the heat of Cas’ gaze as tangible as the blindfold. When Dean inched down the angel’s zipper, the sound was unnervingly loud. 

Both of them froze, uncertain of the next move. It was quite the holy-shit moment, he thought. Dean found a moment to hate himself more and Cas, surely, felt trapped in his own moral throwdown. 

He swallowed, shifted his feet. Behind his sternum, his heart started to fly. 

Somehow, they skipped past the sense of how broken this moment was, and he wondered if maybe the urgency resounding in his chest was what had solidified Cas’ decision. Because seconds later, the angel was yanking Dean’s shirt over his head. His jeans removed next, boxers too. 

Oh, Christ. 

Being naked in the vast, fairly public room teased his fantasies in a wicked way. Lifting a shaky hand, Dean allowed Cas to steady him as he sank to his knees. His turbulent breath caught in his throat, but he powered forward. 

_ You can do this.  _

Dean had craved this moment for years, dreamed of the angel’s taste in multiple shades of the same fantasy. 

But whatever sexual prowess he thought he’d had, it was nowhere in sight. His hands shook as he pulled Cas’ pants to his ankles.  _ C’mon Dean, you know what you’re doing here.  _ But before he could feel his way forward, Cas’ fingers threaded into his hair, pressure guiding his head back. 

Christ, how desperate would he look right then, he wondered? On his knees, chin up, cock up, and blindfolded. 

Probably  _ very. _

A tremor raced through him, and he knew it didn’t go unnoticed. 

Those same fingers that jerked him the night before, now cascaded over his face. Tracing freckles, wrinkles, or maybe the faint blush burning up to his hairline—he didn’t know. Then, the pad of the Castiel’s index finger dragged along his bottom lip. 

His mouth fell open. Between his legs, his erection kicked impatiently. 

_ Christ, it was hard to breathe... _

Dean expected, yearned, for Cas to use his mouth the way he clearly intended it to be used. Instead, Cas dipped two fingers inside, creeping in over his tongue. The briny taste and possessive invasion gave him the strangest flood of relief. 

Worries faded, pleasure soared. This was the high he’d been chasing. 

A raspy exhale blew past his lips, followed by another. It made him sound as desperate as he felt. But, at least, his addiction was being served. And damn well at that. He was riding that blissful dopey feeling, until Cas spoke...

“I’ll give you what you want, Dean,” Cas whispered, “But not the way you want it,” he qualified.

Having no clue what he meant, Dean remained on his knees with his mouth unavailable for a response and waited. 

“I’ll do this with you… whenever and how often you want.” Dean’s heart fluttered at the possibility, but he knew more was coming. “On one condition.”

Cas retracted his fingers, bidding Dean to say something. 

“Wh-what?” he asked brokenly.

“You need to be vocal with me. If you won’t meet my eyes, you can’t be silent. If you lie to me at any time, I will refuse you.” Cas sighed, it sounded defeated and solemn. “Goddammit Dean, this isn’t how lo—”

“—Don’t,” Dean rapidly shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut against the truth. “Please don’t say it. I know what I’m asking of you is fucked up... and selfish… and horrible.” Dean pressed his hand against the blindfold. “I just, I-I need you.” He shrugged, admitting the only thing he could. 

There was a pause. “I know.”

Cas laid a palm against his unshaven cheek, a thumb stroking the edge of the tie. Moving to his lips, Cas hooked a finger in over his bottom row of teeth and tugged his jaw open. 

_ Oh, God.  _

A trickle of precome welled from the tip of Dean’s cock, he felt it skirt over the head where it cooled and settled without dripping free. 

Though he knew it was coming, the blunt presence of Cas’ dick pushing past his parted lips was stark and exhilarating. Dean moaned, wantonly. Saliva built up under his tongue as he savoured the first taste of his angel. Warm, sweet, the nameless essence of carnality.

Either because of Cas’ inexperience, or his lingering anger, he didn’t pause to let Dean adjust. Inch after inch pressed in mercilessly over Dean’s tongue, forcing his lips to stretch and accommodate Cas’ surprising girth. 

He panted through his nose, trying to keep a steady flow of oxygen.

Fuck, Dean could usually pick out when a man was packing, but Cas came as a surprise. A fucking big surprise.  

His thick shaft was smooth and hot, heavy, the curved head soft as it bumped against his throat. Dean had to fight his innate reflexes, holding still, knowing the discomfort would lessen. 

With an affectionate hum, Cas wrapped one hand around Dean’s neck, the other cupping the back of his head and pulling him in infinitesimally tighter. It nearly choked off his air completely, and  _ Christ _ , he’d never felt better. 

“Ohh… fuck,” Cas mumbled, shocked by his own joy. 

_ Yes…  _ Dean soared with pride, gaining a measure of peace over his guilt knowing he was making Cas feel good. He worked his tongue then, eager, sliding it around as best he could before he started to move. As he sucked off, breathing in as he did, Cas groaned above him. 

“Mmnngh, Dean... you fe-feel so good.” 

The angel fisted a chunk of his hair, pulling tight at his scalp. Dean’s untouched cock jerked in an obvious reply. God, he wanted to be touched. He gripped his thighs instead. 

Dean sealed his mouth tight and moved in earnest, pumping himself up and down Cas’ stiff length, leaving it slippery with spit. Jaw aching, lips stretched thin, he craved it more with each drag of his mouth. Moans rumbled from his chest, muffling out over Cas’ sex. He was excitedly sloppy, letting Cas slip free at random, the blunt head smearing his face with precome and his own mess. 

“Dean,” Cas breathed his name. Far too lovingly for Dean’s state of mind. He abruptly stopped, tipping his head back to seeth under the blindfold. 

“Be rough with me,” he demanded. 

Cas groaned, halfway to a growl. More out of annoyance than anticipation. “ _ Dean.” _

“Please,” he begged, his words raw for reasons other than the abuse suffered by his throat. 

“Only if you look at me.”

His mind screamed a solid ‘ _Fuck_ _no’_ but he wasn’t sure he could handle the soft utterances of his name for much longer either. Without saying a word, he shook his head in the negative. Sound, touch, and smell were already lighting up his senses… having Cas’ sharp blue eyes searing down on him. Jesus, he’d lose his damn mind. 

“Fine…” With that, Cas cradled his face and guided him back. With frustrating degrees of caution, the angel worked his cock back in. Nudging inside Dean’s mouth in a tender back and forth motion. 

Using superior strength, Cas kept Dean still. Refused to let him be as filthy and crude as he wanted. Instead, Castiel was slow and gentle, rocking his sex in and out in fluid thrusts, paced just right to feel like Cas was making love to him. In whatever fucked up way a blow job was considered making love… this was it.

It was the sweetest torture. He both loved and hated it. 

Pain thumped with every beat of his heart, every ounce of emotion he suffered surged and sank in waves. It wasn’t long before it swelled over his ability to keep things in check. Tears clouded his eyes, and he wondered if a person’s heart could break from loving someone too much. If that was a thing. Or if it simply made you insane… 

Unable to handle it, he reached up and grabbed at Cas’ thighs to push his friend away. Cas immediately stepped back, his wet erection sliding free of Dean’s mouth, leaving him gasping through a sudden overload of feeling.

Choked up, he sniffed and swallowed to clear himself. 

“Touch me,” he pleaded. Reaching out, he grabbed at nothing. “Cas…”

The wanton demand shocked him, it wasn’t  _ at all _ what he’d meant to say. No, he needed escape, didn’t he? All of this was too much, terrifying. But this craving, this mindless addiction had taken over. Was already in control. “Fucking please touch me…”

Cas moved swiftly in the air around him, and before he knew which way was up, he was being guided onto his back. The angel draped over him, both of them bare, overheated. Planes of skin greeting in need. Reaching out, Dean found the iron bars of the railing and clutched one in each hand for no other reason than needing to hold the fuck on.  

He felt the weight of Cas’ erection nudging against his own, their skin hot and sticky pressed together. 

“Fuck, fuck…” he whimpered, “please, Cas.”

Settling himself into position, Cas lined his cock up against Dean’s and closed his fist around them.  _ Jesuuus.  _ Ecstasy roared through his veins, eyes rolling back as he took note of the faint pulse beating in Cas’ sex… or maybe his own… he wasn’t sure. Didn’t matter. They were melded together in the tight confine of Cas’ hand and he believed for a second this was how it felt to overdose on someone. This ridiculously distorted high.  

“Open your mouth,” instructed Castiel.

Confused and weirdly turned on, he did. Hoping Cas would finger his mouth the way he had before. But no, as soon as Cas’ hand started to pump them below, leaving Dean close to brainless, the angel tongued between his lips. The penetration salacious and proprietary. 

Dean surged off the wood floor, needing more of the sweet taste of Cas’ mouth. His fingers cramped, skin pinching around his grip of the iron rail. Their lips  _ barely _ grazed. A soft, irritated whimper rose from the back of his throat but he was denied. In the filthiest mockery of a kiss, Cas flicked at his extended tongue refusing to take it deep. Taunting him really. Making him more crazed than he already was. 

Jesus Christ, this was how he would die. With his heart pounding too heavily inside the cage of his ribs. Blood roaring in his ears. 

Already, Dean’s hips were moving of their own volition, grinding up incessantly into the circle of Cas’ fingers, everything cramped and aching, his cock fucking against Cas’ rigid sex. Their precome and sweat mixing as they moved in tandem, the world feeling slightly, unnervingly,  _ wildly _ out of control. 

Oh god, was this even happening? Was it a dream? 

Above him, Cas breathed heavily into his gaping mouth. Thick groans rumbled in his chest, but he couldn’t make out whose they were. He was blending into Cas somehow, being drawn in… being...  _ loved _ . 

Renewed emotion and fear burn through him, threatening to steal his baited orgasm. He wouldn’t let it. Nothing would take this from him. 

Not now.

“Uhgn…f’ck” he strained desperately, curses mangled, still wrapped up in the obsence kiss, Cas’ wet tongue gliding against his, teasing the tip. 

They rocked together in a race for climax. Something creaked nearby, his back dragging against the hardwood.  Arousal crawled higher and higher, a pressure building somewhere below his belly button, his balls pulling in tight between his thighs.

It hovered just out of reach, making every muscle flex and loosen in vain. Dean released a sound shockingly close to a sob, “ _ Cas…” _

“I won’t leave this time,” came Cas’ comforting promise. “Let go, I’m here.”

Hearing Cas’ voice, it’s depth and soothing presence, knowing those lips were less than an inch away, was exactly what Dean needed in that moment. 

The exact thing he knew he couldn’t live without once he had it. 

Cas tightened his grip, his pace doubling, movements shallow and determined. And then he kissed Dean...  _ thoroughly _ . Lips sealing over Dean’s in a flagrant claim of ownership. A hot tongue sweeping into his mouth, stealing his only breath. 

Nothing could’ve held him back from the edge then. 

Dean’s orgasm split through him like lightening on a hot, humid night. Each pulse blinding, demanding a reset to his system. The hard, broken huffs of his exterion were swallowed by Castiel’s impassioned kiss, muffling his muted cries. 

Shaking on the hard floor, Dean’s bones grated against the hardwood. Come soaked Cas’ hand, making every instinctual, continuous thrust slippery and euphoric. His aching cock trapped in a snug wet grip, the world shut out to him save for Cas’ touch.  

There was nothing to compare it to. No drug had ever even come close. 

“ _ Mmnghh-nngh _ ,” he moaned from deep in his throat, the sound pitched and disrupted. His brain wondrously scrambled. 

Even before the last spasm rocked through his body, Cas was following his lead. 

The angel’s entire body gave a startled jolt, his warm spend landing in crude streaks across Dean’s belly and chest, mixing into the mess Dean already created. Feeling Cas’ dick flex and release as his orgasm waned exploded fantasies across Dean’s mind, imagining a future with Cas playing out in a series of carnal moments. Hot skin dragging together in darkness, sloppy tongues and needy lips, fingers roaming without care for being kind, intimate wetness filling him… 

Dean never wanted the livestream fantasy to end. He let his mind run wild, careless. 

“ _ Mnghh, _ ” he mumbled pleasantly against Cas’ lips, muscles flinching in the occasional sharp aftershock. 

As the pumped-up high faded to exhaustion, his thoughts became listless, unbothered. They continued to kiss, deep and languid. As if nothing else mattered. Not a single worry invaded his living daydream. 

Not for a whole three minutes. 

Not until his mind revolted; manifesting a violent unstoppable, repeating nightmare of Cas being struck with an angel blade. Again and again, blood pooling to the concrete, grace exploding from within.

_ No, no no… not now.  _

Panic corralled him, shorting his breath and spiking his heart rate. “No, no, no…” he mumbled. 

“Dean, wha—”

In a frantic burst of strength, Dean shoved Cas off and scrambled until his back hit a wall. He drew his knees up and wrapped his arms around his head in a pathetic ball of bad ideas objectified. 

_ Fuck, fuck, fuck… You stupid bastard.  _

“Oh God, I can’t… I’m sorry. Fuck, I just can’t. I can’t, Cas…” he rambled, the words piling up uselessly between them. “I need you, but I can’t handle this… I don’t know how. I don’t—” Everything crashed inward, the walls caving, tears prickled the corner of his eyes and slipped free. Excellent show of willpower, Dean. Really fucking solid. 

“I’m not going anywhere,” Cas replied, his voice stern, frustrated. 

“You can’t promise that!” he shot back, sounding as delirious as he felt. But hey man, that shit was the fucking truth. 

“No.” Cas moved closer, a shift in the air Dean couldn’t see but felt. “I can’t. But you have no control over—”

“I need you to leave.”

The grim silence chasing his words was resounding, loaded with anguish. Wasted opportunities too. But he was being suffocated by dread, future rage and grief kicking out his better sense. It was like wrestling against the current. Couldn’t be done. He could swim and fight, but he’d die anyway. And right now, Dean knew he was toeing the edge of mania, that he was not quite off his rocker but had his ass perched on the edge for sure. One thing he sure as fuck didn’t want, was for Cas to see him fall apart this way. Emotional instability wasn’t sexy, and didn’t do anyone a damn bit of good. Least of all Cas...  _ especially _ Cas. 

Christ, when had everything spiralled so hard? When had he decided to fuck up their relationship, or lack thereof, so monumentally? So irreversibly?

There was no taking it back now. There was only hoping to be better. But in this moment, he needed distance. He needed Cas to be mad. The angel had a right to it, after all this...

At long last, Castiel spoke. The rawness and abjection would haunt Dean for years. “Dean, don’t…” he paused and Dean was certain he felt the angel’s pain, “don’t do this. You’ll regret it.”

_ Already do _ . “Please.”

It would’ve been better then, to pull the blindfold from his eyes, to make a weak promise he’d try to do better. But he just… couldn’t. His hands refused to move. 

Silently, Dean closed his shrouded eyes and slipped into a trance, doing all he could to tune out whatever followed. He wasn’t sure how long he sat there, naked and feeling pretty fucking awful. Probably a good long while, long enough for his skin to turn cold against the open air. 

When he eventually opened his eyes and shoved off the blindfold, he saw his clothes in front of him, neatly folded. 

There was a note set on top. 

_ Dean… perhaps I shouldn’t have kissed you in this contrived affair, sensing your peculiar boundaries of it. Although perhaps I should’ve kissed you a long time ago. Maybe those are my mistakes. But please, don’t let this be yours. Don’t turn me away when you’re hurting or confused… it hurts me as much as it does you. I’m sure you know that. I won’t write or say what I’d like to, not now. For now… I will only say that I’m here. I’m whatever you need  because you are what I need. Pray to me, and I will come to you. Always… forever. Castiel.   _

Closing his eyes against the jagged scrawl of writing, Dean crumpled the note in his fist and got dressed. The final words resounded in his soul;

Always,

Forever. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you guys are still liking it, either way, I'm gonna keep writing. :) It's a change of pace from my DCBB idea.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look friends, it's Wednesday!!! Enjoy.

For the next few days, Dean avoided Cas as if he were a vicious hellhound. In that time, he mended things with Rye through an offering of beer and an appearance at the demon’s door with his tail between his legs. They spent a lot of time trying to put together a half workable plan in the event the Men of Letters decided to make a guest appearance. 

Unfortunately, Dean’s rotten love life—or the tattered appearances of one—was no excuse not to be ready should the subterranean base find itself under a hail of gunfire. 

But still, every moment of those long hours without Cas, a solid one third of his mind was reserved for reliving the taste of Castiel’s skin, the weight of him on Dean’s chest. How the angel’s tongue felt pushing past his lips, adamant, staking a claim in a sort of kiss Dean only thought existed in old timey black-and-whites and romance novels.

No wonder his knees and spine had been weak since, all that bone had been grinded and throttled into mush. 

One bene of all his revelations was the outcome of a deal he’d made with himself. No more booze (or, he considered, within reason) and no green. No pills, no synthetic crutches of any kind. 

Naturally, this meant avoiding Cas too, refusing to pray to him wasn’t easy. By all accounts, it was one of the hardest things he’d ever done. 

A fallback was devised, Rye’s idea, a sort of catch net when he found himself teetering. Whenever he felt the walls closing in, he sparred and wrestled with Sam or Rye. Once with Meg. Pretty sure both he and Meg weirdly got off on that one; talk about weird. But hey, stranger things and all that. She hadn’t wanted to trade dukes at first, thinking he was playing some game with her, but when he told her exactly what he’d done to her Clarence in the vaguest of terms, the demon lashed out with a solid right hook. His cheek was still tender, even now. 

As the current day hovered towards evening and Dean was skipping yet another “family” meal in arguably the weirdest household ever, he picked up the landline and placed a call to his mother. He hadn’t spoken to her since the adrenaline spiked meet-and-greet with the demons that first day. 

She answered, her tone uncertain. “Hello?”

Oh, right. No doubt it said private number. “It’s Dean.”

“Thank God! I’ve been trying your cell. What’s going on over there? Sam’s refusing to speak with me!”

Hmm, she sounded genuinely worried. That shouldn’t surprise him… but it did. “Nothing much. Cell phones don’t work down here, I thought Sam would’ve mentioned that. Anyway, you have nothing to worry about. There a good bunch, mom. S’not what you think.”

“What I think,” she began, her voice motherly and hard, “is that my sons are living with a bunch of demons and you have no idea how tricky they can be—how they can delude you into—”

“Yeah, listen, I’m gonna cut you off right there. First things first,  _ mom _ , telling the Men of Letters about this place was a real dumbass thing to do. Not exactly mindful of your sons’ safety either, considering where they are and all.” He paused, shaking his head. “You seriously better hope they don’t make a move cause these guys are tough shit and if anyone I care about gets caught in the crossfire”—a crisp image of Cas rose in his mind and he almost couldn’t close out the sentence—“I swear to god, I won’t be able to forgive you for that.”

“Dean,” she pleaded, struck by his words. 

“I’m sorry, but you’re just wrong on this. You are. And I got enough shit going on right now that I can’t deal with anything else. So do me a solid, Sam too, and just be our mom. Be are on side for fucking once…” Dean hadn’t meant to sound wistful, but there it was. 

“Sweetheart, what else is going on?”

He chuffed. “Nothing.”

“Tell me. I’m here, I’m listening.” Riiiiiight.  _ Now _ she was pushing to be mom-of-the-year. Where was that a frigging month ago?

“Coulda asked me weeks ago what’s been going on with me, if you’d wanted, when you were staying at the bunker. You didn’t.”

She was quiet for a beat, then, “You’re not much of a talker, Dean. Never have been. Just like your father.” Dean let the silence drag on, remembering his suspicion about his mother and Ketch. “I might be able to help, try me. Dean, please.”

Dean felt a sneer tug at the corner of his mouth. A year ago, he never would’ve imagined feeling contempt for his mother. Whatever, she wanted to strap on her Mom Hat, fine. Time to lay it all out then: “You really want to know? Alright, how’s this for a glorious shitpile: A while back my mom rose from the dead, then I was nearly killed for the hundredth time, my mom ditched me, the devil knocked up a chick, I’m a barely functional alcoholic, borderline addicted to weed, in love with my best friend, basically forced him fool around with me in some depraved sensory deprivation manner for the sole purpose of ensuring I don’t lose my fucking mind.” He drew in a quick breath and motored on, “Not to _mention_ the fact that I’m pretty sure you’re banging Ketch and isn’t that just fucking great.”

With that, Dean slammed the phone in it’s cradle and let out a long exhale. “Wow, that felt good,” he said to himself. 

For a few minutes, Dean debated what to do and how best to pass the time. A faint whisper in his mind begged him to pray to Cas, but he refused. He’d already done enough damage there, no sense in crashing the same car twice. Or… a third time, as it was. Cas deserved more than he could offer, that was the bottom line, and he would do everything in his power not to cave the way he had before, doing everything short of becoming a slave to the drink or a perpetual stoner. 

If all that meant he had to take a few volunteer knuckles to the face every once in awhile, well, how was that really any different from fighting fuglies with Sammy all the live long day. 

Sure, it had been a rough road getting here, the goddamn worst, but Dean had found the line and he wasn’t about to cross it again. Not when his family’s safety was at stake. 

It meant losing Cas as a friend, he knew that. In crossing that line, he’d shattered the veil of friendship they’d held on to for so long. You couldn’t just go back to how things were. Didn’t work that way. 

Waiting on another hour to pass before he felt free to leave the room, Dean reached over to the standard-issue demon hotel nightstand. Wood, two drawers, schmancy glass top. He fingered open the top drawer, closing his eyes. It was mostly empty. 

_ Mostly _ .  

Inside there was a single slip of paper. Folded and refolded now an easy dozen times plus. Every time Dean told himself he’d fucked up and the proverbial door was closed. That note said otherwise and he hated it. A perpetual half open window. 

_ Even if _ , he thought hesitantly,  _ I wanted... to try, how in the fuck would that work?  _ Dean scratched at his face, mindful of his tenderized skull thanks to Meg. It wasn’t as if he had his fears in check, it wasn’t as if he was good at any of this bull-shit. No doubt he would be a terrible partner, or what have you. Boyfriend? Yeah, no. Dean would never be anyone’s boy-anything. 

Considering he’d smacked down Rye’s previous advice, and yet taken it anyway, he figured the demon might have some more treasure trove of knowledge to pass along. Hopefully the guy was done scarfing calories with the rest of the dinner crew. Hopefully, he’d also remember to snipe some scraps for Dean.

Dean skimmed Cas’ letter one more time, his fingers tracing the very unangelic script, oddly charmed by Cas’ horrific man-typical chicken scratch. Then it was back in the drawer again, ready for another mourning session probably later that night. 

He threw on a shirt and hit the halls. 

On the way to Rye’s room—and Dean’s often hang out spot, he ran into Zeta—the demon tearing down the corridor with a twitch in his eye. “Hell may be onto us,” he seethed, his lilac iris’ looking distinctly violent. 

Dean pulled to a stop. “Now?”

“Not yet, but soon. You’d fight with us, yes?”

He didn’t even think about it. “Absolutely. Far as I see it, you’ve proved your worth to me in the time I’ve been here. So yeah, we’ve got your back.”

Zet extended his hand, his eyes meeting Dean’s in mutual respect. Dean accepted his grasp and it was nice to know they understood each other. “You take care of your people, so do we,” he added. “You’re in it with us, man.”

The demon nodded, letting go. “Keep alert, yes?”

“Sure thing.”

They parted ways and Dean never in a thousand years expected to feel on par with a demon. But something was different about them, intrinsically. How they were made, or whoever created them, made room for error. Maybe it wasn’t an error, though, he debated. It was possible whoever cooked up these men had been working some ulterior motives unbeknownst to hell itself.   _ Hmm _ … he’d never given it much thought before. By the time he approached Rye’s door, he was curious and wondered if Rye had all the answers about his own origin story. 

It would make for a good distraction, at least. These days, Cas-distraction plans were all the rage. Didn’t ya know?

He had to knock a few times before the demon opened up, which was unusual. And he saw why when the man pulled the door back. Rye was blitzed out to a degree Dean had never seen, his hipster pompadour haircut disheveled, blueish brown eyes wide and pained. All he wore was a pair of boxers and gym shorts. His chest and abs sparsely decorated in artistic tats. 

Dean pushed his way into the room and closed the door. “What’s wrong with you?”

His friend plunked on the bed, burying his face in his hands. Dean wasn’t sure, but he thought maybe Rye was… crying. Maybe. Did demons cry? “It’s stupid,” his friend mumbled. 

“Obviously not.”

Rye peeked out from behind his fingers and exhaled hard. “You’ll laugh.”

Given the way his buddy was looking, Dean was pretty damn certain he wouldn’t be finding anything funny. “I won’t. Promise.”

“Ok, well…, uh, I went on a date. Against the boss’ explicit orders of course.” 

Why would Zeta redlight any of them dating? “And big boss man gave you a heaping mound of shit for it?” he guessed. 

Shaking his head, Rye brushed it off. “No, no. He’s just looking out for us. That’s not— I don’t even blame him. But I fucking should’ve listened to him anyway,” his voice rose as he spoke, “cause then I wouldn’t have had to deal with some fucking tweaker who not only tried to drug my ass—like hello? Demon, bitch!—But the asshole tried to rob me?! The fucker tried to rob  _ me!?”  _

Rye popped up off the bed and started pacing in the room. “How do you do it? How am I supposed to go out, to like a club every once a goddamn century and try to magically find love?! Is that how it happens? I don’t fucking think so!” he sang, arms wildly gesturing, up and sideways. “You know, we hear all these goddamn stories about how horrible we are, how we were made to be the creepiest of the creeps and you know what, I’m a nice guy, Dean. I’m a real nice fucking guy but right now, gotta say, kinda want to kill some people. Like some serious A-quality murder about now. And that’s wrong,” he rambled, messing his hair further, “I know that’s wrong because it actually pains me to think about it—you know why?!”

Oh, he was asking… “Um, cause you’re a nice guy?” Dean ventured.

“Exactly!” Rye pointed hard in his direction. “Cause I’m a nice fucking guy. But’chya know what? Nice guys finish last, Dean. So maybe, maybe I don’t want to be a nice guy. Maybe I’ve been horny for ten thousand years and I’m getting a little itchy, you know. A little, wee-bit crazy. Everyone’s allowed to go bonkers. I mean, look at you!” 

“Me?”

“Yeah, you’re bonkers as ballsacs!”

Dean was failing to understand how that made sense, but somewhere in all of Rye’s blabbering and flailing he understood one thing: His friend was hurting and alone. Dean could relate. But to be honest, he had zero clue had to comfort the guy. It wasn’t as if he had his own love life figured out. Far fucking from it. There certainly weren’t any ‘How To’ books on comforting demons.

“I just—” Rye seemed to cave in on himself, “I’m actually trying, ya know?”

Christ. Dean steeled himself and walked forward. He wrapped Rye in his arms and gave the demon a damn hug. “Sorry, man,” he shushed, “life’s a royal bitch and it ain’t your fault. Most men are jerks.”

Rye chuckled. “Like you, right?”

Dean couldn’t help but pinch some nearby skin. “Hey now, don’t be calling the guy hugging you any names or he’ll hit the road.”

“Got it.” The demon sagged against Dean with a sigh, toned arms getting snug around his waist. It was kinda nice. Warm, comforting. Fucking cozy, if he were being honest.

It was distinctly clear the moment his arms wrapped around Rye became less cozy and a lot weird. Nothing changed exactly, yet the air around them prickled. Something emanated from Rye, a longing Dean knew all too well. 

For all his solid willpower the last few days, this was  _ really _ not what he needed. 

Rye wasn’t the warm body he craved, but it was a warm body. One he could enjoy without strings if he wanted. The temptation was undeniable. The repercussions and fallout somehow not rising to the forefront of his mind. 

His arms loosened, and Rye eased back a sparse couple inches to look at him. “Well this sure got weird.”

Dean huffed an awkward laugh, finding it wasn’t easy to take a step back. “No shit.”

Every passing second, he thought about putting distance between them. His feet refused to move. Rye was half naked in his arms, hair spiked Einstein-style, and captivating eyes that reflected the same broken vulnerability Dean felt on the day-to-day. 

In that moment, he  _ wanted _ . Not just for the release, but endless other things. Normalcy, an escape, a less complicated hour of his life where he wasn’t only focused on loss, regret, and guilt. 

Commiserating sex sans strings was a tease even a bottle of JD couldn’t hope to compete with. 

One of Rye’s tat’s read, “ _ Feed Your Demons”  _ in casual cursive, and Dean thought… 

_...Okay. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay okay, I know some of you will get to the end and go WHAAAAAT, you said you wouldn't hook up Rye and Dean, and to be fair... nothing has happened. Nothing really. And it won't in this story. HOWEVER, because I am basically in love with Rye (a character of my own creation, which is all kinds of fucked up FYI), I will be posting a side story one-shot thing of Dean and Rye... together because Yum... that basically starts with this chapter and continues on to a satisfying finish.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, for those of you who want to read a separate little porny one-shot of Dean & Rye, [here it is.](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11124252) I recommend reading it before you read this chapter. The Rye/Dean one-shot is completely separate and not meant to be a secret scene or anything to BA, but for continuity it starts off from the previous chapter. 
> 
> Okay, for everyone else :) - Here's another chapter for BA. This chapter is mostly plot, but next chap is all porn my friends.

Dean’s hands were moving, arms releasing his embrace of Rye to cradle the demon’s face. It was difficult, after being on the receiving end of all the guy’s pestering and attitude, to see his features looking soft, his guard down.

Decision made, or perhaps he simply forewent the decision to stop, Dean leaned in, ready to pile on another poorly made—

“ _ Yo! _ ” came a shout from the hall. Followed by a pounding on the door. 

Whatever trance or shared sadness guiding them close was obliterated by the interruption, as if a vacuum had appeared and sucked the moment away with Dyson reliability. 

Startled, both of them jerked back and traded awkward grins. Dean whispered, “It’s probably for the best…”

“Yeah.”  Rye scrubbed at his face, clearly dejected, and went to open the door. Eadric and Grayson stood there, petite Meg lounging on the far side of the hall behind them. “What is it?”

Grayson raised his chin. “Company’s inbound. Boss wants a meeting.”

Uncertain, Rye glanced back at Dean and then to his brethren, “Are the extra’s invited?”

“Why d’ya wanna know?” Meg hummed, “You banging that one, Rye?”

“That one?!” Dean shot back.

“Relax Dean,” she said, her nose scrunched, “I won’t say a word to Clarence. Our little secret.”

He was so livid he couldn’t speak, but Rye stepped up to bat for him. “Meg, cut the shit.”

Unfortunately, her imposing husband wasn’t about to let the unfriendly comment slide. “Watch yourself, my brother.”

Rye, shorter than Grayson by a good half a foot, still managed to meet the challenge of his deep brown glare. “She likes to stir things up and you know it,” he accused.

Wow, if Dean had ever wondered about Rye’s loyalty as a friend, he didn’t have to anymore. The guy was solid. Granted, a buddy he was attracted to, but a good buddy nevertheless. 

Grayson groaned, eyes rolling back. The demon turned to his wife (a term for Meg that Dean still couldn’t wrap his head around), and levelled her with a look. Something between a threat and a sexual promise. “Baby, leave the boys alone.”

“If I don’t?” she simpered, eyes lit with a taunt. 

The demon growled, stalking across the width of the hall. He hoisted her up, and she purred, her short legs tucking in around the man’s hips. For them, the rest of the hallway disappeared and Dean knew neither of them cared a lick about the drama anymore. 

Goddamn, even Meg had a fucking healthy relationship!? Here Dean was, wallowing in his inability to love Cas right  _ and _ nearly going a round with another friend who just happened to be a demon. 

Did he miss some well-adjusted inner-self seminar being doled out to the underworld?  _ I mean, shit. _

After the two lovebirds sauntered off down the hall like conjoined fuck addicts, Dean and Rye were left staring at Eadric; Mr. Hockey Hair. 

Frankly, as much as Dean harped on the Canadian sport, he had to admit… Eadric was really nice on the eyes. Ethereal almost, as if his good looks had been bestowed by a higher power. 

God, Dean must be hard up for it. Everything and everyone was apparently cranking his gears these days. 

“To answer the unanswered question,” Eadric said, his accent similar to Zet’s, “yes, the extra’s are permitted. Let’s go.”

As the three of them navigated the halls, Dean had to break the quiet. If only to stop his mind from wondering what might’ve happened without the interruption. “Guess Meg and Burly won’t be attending then.”

Rye looked over with a smirk, “Oh they will be. Sometimes all ya need is a quickie.”

Was that… was that an invitation? “Yeah?”

The other man grinned, but it was tempered. Never had Dean expected to see a coy side of the demon, but there it was. 

At the end of a mauve hallway Dean had never been down, they crossed the threshold of glass doors into a breathtaking room. Dean wasn’t much for architecture, but  _ whoa. _ In a modest open space, the room was broken into niches by distinct shelves, an oversized seating area, glass walls, and what looked to be part of a jet engine… And towards the back was an office backlit by a window. Though, how could that make sense? They were probably forty storeys deep. 

“It’s a screen,” Sam informed him, coming to stand on his left. 

“Ah,” Dean nodded, reluctant to meet Sam’s judgey hazels. “Spoke to mom earlier,” he said to initiate the conversation. 

“How’d that go?”

Dean sighed, trying to feel guilty but didn’t. “I told her about Cas, accused her of fucking Ketch and hung up on her.”

Silence stretched for an uncomfortable moment. Dean expected an outburst from Sam, swearing or a super-loaded bitchface, but instead, Sam scrunched his nose, lip curled and blurted, “ _ Ketch? _ ”

“I mean, she trusts that guy way too easily for there  _ not _ to be some hanky-panky going on, don’t ya think?”

Shock flitted across his brother’s features. “Mom wouldn’t—”

“She’s single, man.”

‘Yeah, but…” Sam stopped, his eyes caught on something past Dean’s shoulder. His entire oversized posture changed. “Listen,” he lowered his voice, “I’m sorry I was on your case… about Cas. I’m here, you know, if you wanna talk about it. No lectures, no judgement. Promise.”

“Cas is standing somewhere behind me, isn’t he?”

Sam half-smiled, looking apologetic. “Yeah.”

Taking the unsaid cue, Sam turned and moved towards the rest of the group where they were gathered in the sleek office. The meeting was about to start, and only Dean and Cas remained as stragglers. 

As swank as all the crisp glass was, Dean wished there was a brick wall between them and everyone else. Not that he planned to say much of anything, but just looking at Cas felt intimate. Always had, actually. Even from the start.

His mind took that moment to flash back to the past, to the dream in Bobby’s kitchen. Not ever in his life, before that moment, had someone staring at him unhinged him so thoroughly.

With that image hovering in his thoughts, Dean slowly turned on his heel and narrowly met Cas’ eyes. There was no sign of anger, or pain. But Dean imagined it was there. How could it not be? He said nothing, couldn’t find it in him to apologize, knowing the words were useless. 

But he fell into that familiar gaze with ease, watching Cas as the angel stared right back. Their eyes were locked on each other for an unfathomable amount of time. His body warmed in that time, the air between them became tangible same as the space separating them grew cavernous. 

Someone several feet off cleared their throat and Dean reluctantly abandoned the moment, a twinge of pain wrenching across his chest at the sole displeasure of having to tear his eyes away. 

They joined the group and listened to Zeta as he cast his voice in the room, making clear of their current threats. 

Hell, for one, including Crowley. The Men of Letters. And, to a lesser degree, he’d added, the angels. 

Cas stepped forward, concerned but cautious. “Why are the angels a threat?”  

It was a solid question, Dean, plus Sammy by the looks of things, wondered the same. 

Zeta held off his response in a telling way. This fucker had lied to them, thought Dean. Fuck that horseshit. “What the hell didn’t you tell us about this baby?” he demanded.

A hand closed around Dean’s wrist in warning, and he knew it was Rye. “Dean.”

He whipped his head to the right, “D’you lie to me too?”

“It’s not a bad lie, necessarily.” Rye’s words were slightly slurred, the lingering affects of his earlier inebriation. 

Earlier, as in the moment they’d almost— “Oh that’s just great,” Dean blasted with sarcasm. “Demons! Should’a fucking known. Mom was right, Sammy!”

“—Enough!” Zeta’s hard accented voice iced through the room, cooling the atmosphere in a flash. “We lied to you only because we didn’t know if we could trust you, but like you said, in the time you’ve been here, we’ve gotten to know each other. Have we not? I highly doubt you would’ve spilled your secrets to us the first day either, am I wrong?”

Dean was damn tempted to shout how seriously not the same that was. But for fuck’s sake he wanted to know what else was up with the demon spawn. “Just spill the beans, man.”

Their leader levelled his eyes with Cas, lilac iris’ showing compassion. Maybe a hint of uncertainty, leading Dean to wonder whether they trusted Cas much at all. “The child’s power is essentially the same, we did not lie about that. We simply… omitted that demons are not the only being susceptible to those powers.”

“What are you saying exactly?” Castiel pressed, his jaw tight.

“That, should you wish, you could be human too. Everything,  _ everything _ supernatural… could become… human.”

Electrified silence crept through the room, making each of them uneasy. The demons, as they awaited their visitors reactions, and the rest of them… taking a moment to absorb the new information.

Cas?  _ Human… _ Would Cas even want that? It would mean Cas was vulnerable, but perhaps less of a target too? Christ, the hypotheticals were gonna drive him nuts.  

“Meaning,” Sam assumed, “that this could be,  _ potentially _ , used as a weapon?”

They resounding lack of response was answer enough. No wonder everything that went bump in the night, or flew in the skies, or dwelled in the bowels below was getting their panties in a twist and heading this way. 

Sure, maybe these ancient lovesick demons wanted an out, but there were a fuckton of other supes that viewed this child as a nuclear bomb. 

Awesome. 

“Oh, we’re so screwed,” Dean mumbled, exasperated, shaking his head. Wasn’t this all just so fucking pointless now. There was no way they could fight off all of Hell, and the Angels, and fucking everything else!  These were ripe delusional demons, no doubt about that. 

_ Might as well love Cas while you can _ , his mind nagged. 

Sam spoke out, “I assume you have a plan?”

It was Grayson who smiled first. “Damn right we do.”


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for any spelling errors, etc. :) Also this was a long fucking chapter.

It was cockamime plan, but a plan that _could_ work. The odds weren’t great. Sam was even less hopeful than he was but already his younger brother was heavy into the details with the others. No longer panicked but planning, moving towards ready. Rye was juiced up, the smile—however temporary—sat bright across his expression.

Adrenaline spiked the atmosphere of the room as everyone geared up for a fight. Whenever _that_ would be. It wasn’t as if the bad guys were going to send them an evite. Zet had heard that demons, the bad kind obviously, were headed this way. As it stood, they had zero surplus in the demon department.

Either way, Dean wasn’t too concerned about a fight. Besides it would all be an act. Sure there was always a level of danger when you went out fighting… well... _everything_. But only for the amount of time it took to perform a little David Blaine bullshit and hopefully convince the entire non-human world that the Nuclear Baby was dead.

If they failed, they died.

And on that happy note, Dean paced away from the crowd gathered around the leader’s desk and found himself moving across the front room towards the door. He should stay, help out with whatever they were doing. Instead, he wandered into the hall.

He didn’t make it far before his brain was too scrambled to keep his legs moving. Dean stopped and leaned against the wall. It was one of those days, he reflected. The potential last day on earth sort of thing.

Christ, he’d had far too many those.

Footsteps drew his attention to the left. Cas was silently coming towards him, their eyes met and he tried to force any expression onto his face to dial down the awkward. A smile, a frown, anything; he simply stared.

When their paths connected, Cas paused and leaned against the opposite wall. The angel’s head was tilted, blue eyes studying Dean. It occurred to him that he and Cas have probably had more silent conversations than vocal ones.

“Cas,” he started off, his focus dropping to the carpet, “I don’t know what to say anymore.” Everything about this moment screamed defeat. He just wasn’t sure what was being defeated… or who would win.

He glanced up in time to see the angel’s face twitch with a there-and-gone expression before he got a hold on whatever he didn’t want Dean to see. But Dean definitely saw the narrowed eyes that came after as Cas appeared to calculate something. Man, what he wouldn’t give to be able to read those thoughts.

Decision apparently reached, Cas pushed off from the wall and moved on him, grabbing his wrist in an iron hold. “Come with me.”

Dean tumbled after the abrupt lurch, his jaw hanging open. “Uh, where are we going?”

His question was met with silence. Not exactly shocking, but it certainly had his heart picking up pace. More so than it had for the thought of oncoming violence as discussed earlier.

Jesus, what the hell were his priorities anyway? Near-death experience? _Meh._ Near-Cas experience? _Fucking_ _cardiac arrest._

Cas dragged his ass down two lengths of hallway before he pulled to a stop at a random door and threw it open with an airy flick of his fingers. It was pitch black inside when Dean was pushed through the threshold.

The door slammed shut with a resolute crack.

 _Shit._ He couldn’t tell if he was terrified or eager. Cas would obviously be the deciding factor on that one. Though he didn’t have the reassurance of site, he knew Cas was in here with him.

“Cas?” By the way his voice resounded, the room couldn’t have been any bigger than a walk-in closet.

The only man he couldn’t shake or hope to ignore stepped into his personal space. Dean drew in a breath and held it, puffing himself up… baiting whatever this moment was. Cas’ left arm curled around him, the angel’s warm palm coming to rest flat at the base of his spine. Their chests rose and fell against one another. An unshaven cheek scruffed against his, sending chills down his neck. They were unnervingly close. Cas exhaled, a humid and balmy fatigued expression, rushing over the shell of his ear, ghosting over his pulse.

Dean didn’t know what this was or where it was going, but a large part of him didn’t care.

He stood stock still, afraid to disrupt the quiet, fists clenched and unable to see a damn thing. Not even a hint of light crept under the door.

In some bewildering trance, rendered by Cas’ silence or his presence or his powers, Dean let out the stale breath in his lungs and relaxed.

Not sure how he knew, but Castiel had definitely grinned at the feel of his body surrendering tension. “We’re going to have a question and answer time. Yes or no only, understand?”

Fuck. “Okay.”

Half his mind rebelled, the fear still thick and relentless. It mingled with his self-loathing and had been rendering him gutless and paralyzed for so long now but he couldn’t fucking take it anymore. So long as Cas was driving the ship, he was okay with shouting directions.

“Are you and Rye engaging in intercourse?”

He nearly snorted. Only Cas would phrase a question that way. Guilt had him hesitating. The hand at his back exerted pressure reminding him to speak up. “No.”

“Did you kiss him?”

“Almost.”

There was terrifying beat of silence until Cas spoke again. “Yes or no answers will suffice. Now, do you believe that I would do anything for you?”

“Yes,” he said with an air of bitterness. Just because Cas _would_ didn’t mean he _should._ How had the angel not gotten that yet.

Then he asked another question, softer this time. “Do you believe that I love you?”

When he answered, he curled in towards Cas’ frame. “...Yes.”

Cas’ lips brushed against his ear. Voice quieter still, “Do you love me?”

The world tilted. His heart thudded over a beat like a dying chugging motor. “You know I—” His confession was cut short by the appearance of Cas’ hand over his mouth. It occurred to him that Cas really enjoyed shutting him up that way.

“Yes or no.”

The impeding hand disappeared. Dean inhaled and opened his mouth. “Yes.”

Everything changed the moment he confessed. And he didn’t entirely know why. It wasn’t like they’d moved, or the lights came on, or that Cas was being told something he didn’t already know. Still, the room was charged.

In that moment, he knew they were moving forward somehow. In whatever crazy dysfunctional relationship it would be.

“Do you want me?” Castiel asked. And if Dean wasn’t mixing reality and fantasy, he was pretty sure Cas had nudged his hips a little closer.

 _Right, like I need incentive._ “Yes,” he grated, his desire searing his words.

Cas’ fingers curled against his spine. “I suppose that was a selfish question, wasn’t it. Seeing as I already know the answer.”

For a second, he nearly laughed. He did smile though. “You knew all the answers,” he reminded.

“Not with any degree of certainty. Except the last one.”

Christ, did he seriously believe that? “Cas,” he argued, “you knew how I feel about you.”

“Do I? How’s that? From the way you’ve been ignoring me or from all those times you’ve told me? Or perhaps I should rely solely on the few glimpses into your subconscious. You know I try not to do that.”

Even as Cas’ voice tightened, his hold on Dean didn’t let up. Dean shrank into it, his apology coming out bleak and feeble. “I’m sorry, you know I’m not… that I can’t just…” _be honest_. Finish a fucking sentence. Do the right thing. Take your damn pick.

“Yes, I’m quite aware of your limitations.” Despite the jibe, Cas didn’t say it with even a drop of acidity but something far worse: _pain._ And lots of it.

All of it caused by yours truly. Not that he didn’t deserve to feel like an asshole. He was one. It still felt like there was a knife joyriding through his chest.

“As it happens,” Castiel continued on a sigh, “I love you regardless.”

The knife became a swollen balloon and Dean wasn’t sure if he’d make it out of this fucking closet alive. “Not that I deserve it,” he muttered. “Cards on the table, man, I can’t be what you—”

There was a thick groan cutting him off, and a certain eye roll. “Dean, when have I ever asked for more than what I knew you could give? When have I ever pushed you?”

“I do recall you shoving me into this closet.”

A low growl rolled out against his ear and his knees almost gave out. “Is anything about this funny to you?”

 _No._ But if he didn’t lighten the mood he might explode into human shrapnel. Whatever, they were in this convo now and there was no undoing it. Bombs away. “Alright,” he replied steadily. “No, you haven’t.”

“I’ve given you space, and perhaps too much of it. Because the truth is,” Castiel said sternly, “you don’t need space… you need _me_ . Dean,” the angel paused and drew a thick inhale against his skin; both of them knew he didn’t _need_ air. “I can feel it. Every dream you have, every nightmare, every time your heart accelerates, or stops. I feel _you_. I sense all of you… every second of every day and I can’t take it anymore.”

Everything about Cas in that moment surrounded him. The words. That deep, gravelly voice. The angel’s complicated knee-weakening scent. Not to mention five feet and eleven inches of smooth muscular lines and a mess of hair Dean wanted to bury his hands into.

Right then, he wanted to be with Cas more than any fear could stop him. But he still tried to protest because loving someone never meant you wouldn’t or couldn’t let them down.

“It kills me to hurt you.”

“And it kills me to watch you suffer.”

Dean was running out of arguments. “Timing’s kinda shitty,” he mumbled lamely.    

“When isn’t it?” the angel cheekily shot back. “I’m stronger than you think, Dean. I can carry the weight of whatever this is… so long as this… _is._ You only need to let me.”

Control had mostly evaporated, leaving him unsteady on his feet. Every inhale gave him more of Cas’ scent, an almost flavour on his tongue. “I want to,” he admitted. “But I can’t promise you I won’t pull back or panic and take it out on you.”

“What if I don’t let you?”

Curious, Dean raised chin and spoke directly into Cas’ ear, “And how exactly would you do that?”

“Exercising control over you. I believe the term is… dominance.”

Did Cas seriously just say that? Fuck.

Man, if he wasn’t hard already… Wait, no. There was _no_ way Mr. I Don’t Get Pop-Culture References was on the up-and-up regarding fringe sex. Dean cleared his throat and had to be sure. “Uh, you do know that means kinky sex, right?”

“You do know that’s not _all_ it means, _right?_ ” Cas haughtily fired back.

Huh. Guess the guy did know. “Yeah, uh, I get that… I just, I—” he stammered and started over. “Fuck, Cas, this wasn’t what I was expecting when you hauled me into a pitch black broom closet, wrapped your arm around me and started whispering less than an inch from my face. And now you’re wanting to shake up our practically non-existent sex life, I’m just not sure how any of this is going to—”

The hand was back. Fucking angel stop sign.

“Dean.” Cas pressed into the curve of his spine, his dry lips brushing the skin below his ear. “I’m suggesting that you let go in a way you can understand. You only have to say yes once. After that, you’ve given yourself to me, to _this._ And if,” he paused to correct himself, “ _when_ you start to panic, I will rein you in unless I feel as though I’m doing you or both of us more harm than good. And if you’re wanting specifics, there are multiple means of ensuring you don’t run.

“I can physically restrain you or verbally demand you not to go, lest there be consequences of course. I can also demand that you be honest and open with me. I’m sure all of this you’re familiar with. Seeing as you don’t seem to ever clear the laptop’s browser history.”

Cas had snooped through his browser history?! Oh god.

“— _Mnngh_ ” he tried to mumble an apology or an excuse. But it was useless, Cas didn’t budge.

“Dean,” his voice deepened, “I’m only trying to tailor your needs to your desires in the hope that… maybe we can meet somewhere in the middle of this mess we’ve created. If you say yes, I won’t let you pull away. Because I know that’s not what you want. But _if_ you say yes, the days of dancing around this are done. I need you to understand that.”

Fuck. This was it, wasn’t it. Dive in and hope to swim or drown in three feet of water until sharks ate him, ‘cause really, those were his choices.

No better offer would ever top it. Say yes once, and he could lay all the weight of his fears on Cas. Give his angel full control. No more chickening out or ducking down, no more defaulting to the safety zone of loneliness.

Sure as shit it would be a rocky ass start to a relationship. Kinky as fuck too, apparently. But at the end of the day, Cas would be in his bed. The man’s lips within reach. No escape…

Even if he wanted one. _That_ was the caveat here.

But you know what? Nothing made more sense to him. When had Dean ever been able to let his guard down? All of his relationships were strained and stumped. He couldn’t love people right because he grew up seeing a sharp correlation between love and death. He needed more than his own willpower to get over that.

He needed Cas. And if his partial psychosis pushed him to cut and run, he had Cas to make sure he’d stay put. It wasn’t pretty, and from the outside it would never appear like a healthy relationship. But for them? For _him?_ It fit in ways he couldn’t begin to understand.

No doubt Freud would have some choice words about it, but Dean was also pretty fucking positive the guy had never dealt with inter-species relationships where death and life saturate the every day.  

It gave his heart a pinch realizing the burden this would be on the man who was supposed to be his best friend.

The silence and thick shadow pressed between them, his mind feeling the creeping distance as he went through the necessary thought gymnastics involved in a decision like this.

Cas’ palm had already slid down his jaw, long fingers curving around his neck. It grounded him.

A yes was building on his tongue. He bit it back. “I need to close my eyes,” he cautioned, “just at first… when things are too much. I don’t,” he faltered, unsure of the reason for it. “I don’t know why anymore. Is that okay?”

“It’s okay…” Cas answered slowly. “But I won’t have intercourse with you until you can look at me. I need that.”

“Incentive?” he teased.

Cas’ lips hovered over his skin, touching only the fine hairs. “Unadulterated connection,” he corrected. “When we cross that step, Dean, it will be thorough and complete and intense, and… those remarkable green eyes will be on me. Telling you I love you will never be the same as seeing it and _feeling_ it.”

There was definite possibility Dean was wading in dreamland. Because this moment was too fucking unbelievable. Knowing his luck they’d all die tomorrow in a fiery explosion. He let out a thick sigh, feeling almost the same as he did when he was about to board a plane.

“Dean?”

Fuck it. “Okay,” he rushed out, shook his head. “I mean, yes.”

An eternal second passed before Cas spoke. Dean was sure his stomach hit the floor.

“Yes, what?” Cas demanded knowingly.

For the first time since he was thrown into the room, Dean moved his arms—both hands rising up to frame Cas’ face. “ _Yes_ , I want to be with you. _Fuck yes_ . But, Cas, I won’t sugar coat it… I will crack and try to leave. I know who I am, and I know my limitations. _Obviously_ ,” he said with an edge, “so do you. So you need to stop me, and I’m fucking serious on this one. I hate that that’s on you, but here we are.” He paused, then added, “Also, please, please stop saying intercourse.”

For the first time in God only knew how long, Cas laughed. It was short-lived but he’d take it. “It _is_ the correct term,” the angel insisted. “If I were to have said sex, penetration wouldn’t necessarily be implied.”

Smiling, Dean pulled Cas towards in close until their noses bumped. “Last chance, Cas… from here on out we’re like… _together_. For real. Dysfunctional and all. Me saying yes binds you in this too, don’t forget that.”

Cas hummed, cocking his head in Dean’s hands. “Of the two of us, I believe you will be bound far more than I.”

This fucker. “You know what I mean.”

“Being bound to you, profoundly or otherwise,” he noted, a grin to his voice, “is not something that would ever give me pause or hesitation.”

“Okay then.”

Jesus fuck, this was it. They were a goddamn couple. No one was panicking here. Nope, not even a little. How does one even _start_ a relationship? They should probably kiss or something. Or have non-penetrative sex, he thought with a snort.

“Should we head back to the others now... or?” Cas lilted the question, not hiding his insinuations even a bit.

“Or I could kiss you?” he suggested, feeling unexpectedly timid.

Cas’ arms closed tight around his waist, his breath warm on Dean’s face. “No one’s stopping you.”

He swallowed his nerves and closed the hair-thin gap between them. Cas’ pliant lips melted against his. They savoured the first rush of warmth and connection before Dean sought a deeper kiss, his tongue dipping into the slick intimacy of the angel’s mouth.

The darkness may have been to blame but Dean wasn’t sure which way the door was anymore. Everything was foggy and distant compared to the hyper-vivid feel of Cas’ breath on his tongue and those thick lips plush against his.

When Cas’ tongue responded to his, urgency seized the moment. Both of them pushed for a better taste of the other. A moan roared up from his chest when he felt Cas take over.

And not just the kiss. Using strength Dean couldn’t even begin to challenge, Castiel raised Dean clear off his feet. Air rushed past and then his back slammed into a wall. Instinctively, he wrapped his legs around Cas’ hips, feeling awkwardly too big.

The negative emotion was bowled over as Cas moved on from his mouth and worked a trail of spit and teethmarks down his throat. All the while the angel’s hips rocked and thrusted into the vee of his spread legs.

“Cas,” he murmured, his head thrown back against the wall. “Maybe we should, uh… uhh, _fuck_.” That sentence had definitely been going somewhere but the way Cas’ hand was feeling down the centre seam of his jeans remedied that.

“You’ve always been mine,” Cas commented, his voice a growl, between sucking kisses along his shoulder. His cotton shirt somehow split open as if Cas was Moses but with clothes. “Now it’s simply official.”

Dean laughed, the mirth immediately followed by a sharp hitch as Cas’ prying fingers seemed to find _just_ the right spot and _Christ_ why couldn’t the guy tear his pants apart too?

“Official, huh,” he huffed. “Sounds-sounds pretty serious.”

“As a heart attack.” Castiel tore Dean’s shirt again only to place a startlingly tender kiss over his left pectoral. “Speaking of, you should settle yours just a little…”

“Right,” he chuffed sarcastically. _Like_ that’s _gonna happen._

Between Cas’ assaulting teeth and hot mouth, not to mention his taunting fingers, Dean wasn’t going to be settling anything. Not his heart. Definitely not his cock.

A distinct rip, thick and ragged, sliced through the black surroundings and cool air met the back of his thighs and over the curve of his ass. He hiccuped through his next breath and felt Cas’ fingers thread along the crease of his ass, not purposeful or with direction but simply feeling him.

“Oh fuck.” His cock swelled and pushed awkwardly against the tight stretch of his jeans still covering his front. If they weren’t going to fuck, what all could Cas possibly— “ _Oh my god…”_

Two magically slick fingers pushed unceremoniously past the ring of muscle into his ass and his cock wept precome, his boxers now gliding over the sensitive tip of his erection.

“This time you are not allowed to pull back or shy away. I want you to feel me, feel everything I’m doing to you.”

Dean nodded loosely. He was swimming with sensation, and couldn’t imagine it was only from Cas’ fingers. There had to be more going on.

“Does this feel good?” Pointedly, Cas curled his fingers inside Dean and his body jerked at the rush of fiery tingles racing out from his core.

“ _Yesss_ ,” he hissed, his voice warped and thready.

“Good, now kiss me while I make you come,” demanded Cas.

Jesus. Dean threw his weak arms around Cas’ neck and pulled him close, blindly searching for the man’s lips. When they brushed his, he moaned at the relief and then a thicker moan rose up as Cas cork-screwed into him over and over.

Good god, the angel had talented fingers. _Gorgeous, looong fingers._

When thought was out the window, he defaulted to mindless instinct. Fighting against Cas’ iron hold in a vain attempt to get some friction on his aching groin. But the position wasn’t helpful, and neither was Cas for that matter. If only the angel had another hand. Hell, maybe his non-human form had seven hands. A man could hope. 

Just as Dean hit a plateau, unsure of whether he’d actually be able to come in his current state of frustration and limited friction, Cas ceased fucking him with his fingers and kept them deep and curled, stroking…  and _holy fuck_.

Dean was no stranger to having his prostate worked, but this… this was different. It wasn’t just a shot of pressure and the distinct sense of an oncoming yet suspended orgasm, it was far more intense, pleasure rising and rising, causing tremors to wrack his frame. Kissing wasn’t possible, he could barely keep his legs locked around Cas’ hips.

It started to become too much and not enough and he whined for things he couldn’t verbalize. _More_ and _please_ apparent with every hitched breath and low whiny groan.

Out of the haze of arousal, he was suddenly overcome by Cas’ voice, clear and disembodied inside his mind. _This is what we truly feel like together… and it is more than physical. Has always been more..._

Oh, fuck. Dean snapped his head back, feeling and hearing Cas in ways far beyond the norm of human experience.

_You’re going to come for me, exactly when I want you to... and when you’ve finished… there will be no panic and no withdrawal. To be sure of that, as soon as your feet hit the ground, I want you on your knees._

Cas was in his head?! Determined curiosity fought through the fog in his mind.

“I don’t…uhm, I—but _how_?” he breathed, his tongue too dry to be any clearer than that. The pressure at the centre of his hips strained, his muscles cramping and shaking.

And god, those fingers… ceaseless and just the right constant motion. Just the right amount of blindingly good pressure.  

His orgasm hovered just out of reach and he was fucking certain it was kept at bay not by his own body or his utter absence of will but through angelic meddling.

“Explanations later,” Cas replied. He tucked in closer to Dean, his mouth tugging at Dean’s earlobe.

Goosebumps prickled his skin feeling Cas’ scruff on his neck. “Fuck, Cas…” he whimpered, desperate beyond shame.

 _I haven’t quite done this before,_ Cas cautioned, _but I imagine it will feel… rather intense._

One second later, Dean was shouting his throat raw. He came apart in waves. It simultaneously hurt and ached and felt so good he wanted to cry for a week. Spiked ecstasy shot through his veins in pulses timed to the beat of his heart. The feeling was so absolute, he barely noticed his seed spilling into his boxers and snaking towards his skin where it soaked his pubic area.

Immediately after, he passed out for a minute or two. When he finally rose above the thick aftershocks of his release, the room was certainly quieter. He was empty and being held against the wall, his skin tacky and his brain a thousand percent scrambled.

Holy fuck… if being fingered by Cas was that intense, what the goddamn hell would being fucked by him in full daylight be like?! Even now, he felt the telltale twist in his heart and a familiar plummeting sensation he was growing to hate.

Cas’ voice came back to him then. _There will be no panicking, remember?_

Right. But, how was he supposed to shut off a lifetime of predisposed gut reactions? A man couldn't just—

“Dean,” Cas growled, “Feet on the floor.”

His muscles trembled but he unhooked his heels and let his legs fall like dead weights to the ground, his knees wobbly.

Cas pressed on, “And now?”

Moaning as he remembered, his sated cock weakly trying to thicken, he grabbed onto Cas’ biceps and braced his weight as he sank to the floor. His hands latched onto Cas’ pants with energy he hadn’t known he still had. With Cas’ pants gone and his erection somewhere between Dean and the impenetrable shadows, he reached out and trailed his hands up Cas’ thighs until his hand curled around the base of Castiel’s feverishly hot erection.

He leaned forward, knees and thighs protesting the strain, and opened his mouth to take Cas in. All his budding panic was shoved aside and he focused only on making Cas feel good.

Clutching Cas’ muscular thigh with one hand, the other gripped around Cas’ shaft, Dean bobbed and sucked and moaned, savouring the subtle kicks against his tongue, the feel of the angel’s cock swelling even still.

Cas’ hands locked around the back of Dean’s head and kept him close, throaty groans falling down to his ears.

It didn’t take long and by the time Dean was rapidly moving his lips and hand in tandem, a continuous rumble of sound pouring from his chest as if he were fucking purring around Cas’ sex, the angel was flinching and whispering his name, curling over him.

Dean decided to pray.

 _You can come,_ he said, _I won’t run… I’ll be here. No restraints needed this time, promise._

Not that Cas could tell he was smiling into the thought or not, his words had the intended effect.

Castiel choked out a broken curse and panted as he started to come. Salty release flooded Dean’s mouth and he kept sucking, swallowing all of it.

This too, was different than before when he’d sought Cas out to feed his addiction. The second after he swallowed, he felt… warmer.

But that was weird, right? You don’t soak up angel essence by gulping seed.

_Right?_

Maybe it was smart to ask about that sort of thing. “Um, Cas?”

“Do I need to restrain you?” his friend asked in a hoarse voice.

Checking his psychological state of mind he realized there was definite level of fear and panic hanging around but not enough to be a problem right then. He pushed it down and ignored it as best he could.

“No, no,” he said quickly, while Cas pulled him to his feet. “But uh, care to explain why the other times felt like sex… and this time felt…” Hmm, how to phrase it? “Felt, uh… supernaturally _charged?_ ”

Cas chuckled, and Dean could hear the sated relaxation in the soft lull of his deep baritone. “Because I didn’t hold back.”

“Okay, but what exactly aren’t you holding back?”

If there had been a light on, Dean was certain he’d see Cas’ dark brown eyebrows furrowed in thought. “Myself. The precisely non-human part.”

“Yeah I would definitely say that experience was not of the human-grade variety. Fucking awesome… but _definitely_ straying outside the lines of what I’m used to.”

Cas hummed and folded Dean into a hug. Nothing more, and no less. A warm hug that had him sagging bonelessly into Castiel’s undeniable strength.

“You’re not running,” noted Cas.

Dean smiled and breathed in Cas’ scent. “Not at the moment, no.”

“Good. You will be sleeping beside me tonight, by the way.”

He swallowed, knowing that _every_ moment with Cas would compound his future grief. It was like the pain was already in the moment.

Gritting his teeth, he forced himself to accept it. “Okay.”

“And every night here after.”

His breath came faster. “Mm-hm…”

“Dean?”

“Yeah,” he mumbled, the single word wobbly on his tongue. 

“Give me your hand.” 

Since he couldn’t see worth a damn, he shot his hand into the darkness and let Cas take it. Same as on the way in, the angel dragged him to what he assumed was the door but he’d gotten fairly turned around and couldn’t be sure. The pace of his heart soared and he couldn’t think rationally. He was simply...  _ afraid.  _

At this point, he knew he had to get over it. He knew the days of being ruled by it had to be done. But wanting to  _ not _ panic and actually  _ not  _ panicking was the difference between shooting yourself in the face and being shot in the face. Control versus chaotic inability.

A door opened and he expected the bright lights of the hallway. Instead there was more darkness. Not quite as dark, but… still small and closet-like.

“Uh, where are we?”

Cas didn’t answer and reached for yet another door. When exactly his encounter with Cas had turned into a foray into Narnia he wasn’t sure. 

Finally there was light, opening into a room similar to his own. He saw the duffle he’d given Cas years ago tucked into a corner under a chair. 

“How the fuck did we end up in your room?”

Cas turned to him, head tilted. “The passway,” he pointed behind them. “They’re all over the base. You didn’t know?”

Evidently not. “Tricky bastards these demons.” 

Dean was reminded of the meeting before he’d gone off with Cas. Knowing Rye had straight up lied to him was a sore point but he supposed he understood. What was more concerning was the impending showdown. And of course the whole not freaking out over how much being with Cas terrified him to his bones. 

Sensing Dean’s phantom pain, Cas strode up to him and started to remove his loose, dirty clothes. For this, Dean kept his eyes open and watched Cas meticulously undress him.

When he was naked, Cas steered him to the bed and he crawled under the covers where Cas’ unique scent had permeated the sheets. It drowned him and the deep useless grief he couldn’t shake made his chest feel heavy as lead.

Dean curled his legs around a mound of blankets and pressed his face to the pillow, drawing in a long breath. With one eye still on Cas, he studied the angel’s movements as he slipped out of his jacket, loosened his tie, and unbuttoned his shirt.

When Cas came to bed donning only his boxers, he nudged Dean over and slid in under the sheets until their naked knees and thighs brushed together.

Dean’s eyes flickered closed. He felt Cas’ palm settled against his cheek and he peeked through the dimly lit room to see Cas staring back at him, his blue eyes filled with a watchful concern.

“I’m okay,” he mumbled, already half asleep.

“I can still feel you. I know you’re in pain…”

Dean huffed and didn’t bother to respond.

“Tell me this, how would you feel if you kept running and avoiding me… and this moment,” he peered at Dean, his thumb brushing against Dean’s skin, “never happened. If you leave because you’re afraid of losing me, not only is it ironic, I truly think you should be more afraid of not taking advantage of every moment we do have together.”

Logic was all fine and dandy until thirty-odd years of established cause-and-effect psychosis came into the picture.

“Easier said, and all that,” he countered.

“I know,” Cas whispered, his body shifting closer. “We’ll get there.”

He nodded, losing hold on consciousness as Cas’ fingers snaked through his hair and scratched bewitching patterns across his scalp.

All this time, he’d compared Cas to an addiction. Undeniable and consuming and life-altering. Now, he had willingly signed up for on overdose.

God help the world if shit went wrong.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, Dean relents to Cas! What do ya'll think so far? There's going to be quite a bit of plot weaving in here soon but Cas and Dean are official an item. :):)


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FYI, kink alert: cockwarming, rimming -- Done specifically for a friend... you know who you are xxxx. Also, this chapter is entirely porn. I'm not sorry. I was in a, umm... a mood. *coughs nervously* *runs away*

Dean was waiting for the other shoe to drop and the suspense was a killer. 

Hell, he’d gone and said yes to Cas, and now the whole gang new the devil’s offspring was a supernatural nuke. 

There was no way shit wouldn’t hit the fan soon. 

But two days dragged by and no monsters or angels showed up to wreak havoc and steal any babies. On the one hand, no immediate danger was awesome. On the other far more suspicious hand, Dean would bet his nuts this calm little interlude was a big fat precursor to some end of the world chaos. 

Kelly’s pregnancy was motoring along, progressing faster than all of them expected and Rye figured she’d be delivering in a month and a half. All of their predictions had been shot to hell. 

On the third night sleeping in Cas’ bed, Dean had rigourously pushed his brain through every horrific outcome. It was a great way to prepare for the insanity to come but it didn’t exactly help his situation with Cas. 

It had become abundantly clear the last couple days that neither of them entirely knew what being in a relationship entailed. So far they hadn’t told anyone what was going on. The base was a big easy place to keep secrets. 

One of those secrets he’d only discovered earlier that day when he’d gone to look for Kelly and found Zet kneeling next to where she lay on the leather sofa watching movies, his hand cradling her face, both of them gazing at each other with unmistakable adoration. 

Dean had backtracked damn fast and hadn’t said a word.

Uncomfortable and unable to sleep, he twisted in the sheets to face Cas. It was dark in the room and he couldn’t see much but he reached out and smoothed his hand across the thin sheet covering Cas’ warm, sleepy shape. The duvet cover had long since been shoved to the floor. 

So far, he hadn’t disappointed them. No running and no second-guessing. Well, no  _ verbal _ second-guessing anyway. 

Knowing sleep would evade him all night unless he did something about it, he squirmed under the sheet until he was about eye-level with Cas’ hips. Moving the sheet out of the way, he buried his face close and licked at Castiel’s soft cock. It was balmy in the cramped space at the juncture of Cas’ hips, but he didn’t care. He lapped at the tip, running his tongue along the ridge until he felt Cas stir. 

“Mmnn.”

Dean smiled and closed his lips around the smooth head and suckled gently, trying to coax Cas awake. 

It didn’t take long before a few low moans rumbled down to greet him and fingers sank across his head, twisting into his hair. 

Of all the things he expected to love about being with Cas, getting him off was by far the best. It wasn’t any one thing, but all of it combined. How he tasted, how warm he was, how his thick moans were so gritty and arousing. The way his fingers curled into a fist when he was about to come. 

It was an unhurried moment and he loved the sense of calm that had come over him. Cas grew hard buried inside his mouth, and he lazily sucked and licked at the full girth. His lips hummed over Cas’ shaft, the tip of his tongue teasing the slit and down the underside. 

The fingers tangled in his hair further and he felt Cas starting to tense. The angel’s slow breaths became choppy and mixed with muffled moans, as if his arm or a pillow covered his face. 

Dean never thought sucking cock could be relaxing, but he was almost groggy now. Wanting to be closer, he wrapped his arm around Cas and pulled his angel’s hips closer. 

Dean buried his face into Cas’ groin, forcing the man’s thick sex deep into his mouth and rested there, letting the weight sit on his tongue. He felt Cas’ fingernails scrape over his scalp, and a low whisper trickled down to him, “ _ Don’t move.” _

Half-asleep as he was, Dean thought the suggestion was a fabulous idea. And hilarious if he happened to fall asleep like this. But the longer he lay there motionless with his jaw open and his mouth stuffed full, his cock reacted and quickly hardened, making Dean acutely aware of how weird this was. 

It began as something sensual. Connection without purpose. As simple as Dean wanting to be close to Cas and ultimately being lazy about it. Now, it felt… distinctly kinky. 

Did Cas really not want him to move? Or had he just wanted a break?

Wondering about it, Dean started to retract, making it barely an inch when the hand on the back of his head turned as immovable as stone. Dean’s heart fluttered and settled, the immediate sense of  _ I can’t move _ taking over the  _ I don’t want to move _ portion of his brain. The result was the same, but the former had him suddenly tense, arousal settling low in his gut. 

“Your mouth is very warm,” Cas commented, his tone listless. 

Dean hummed and settled back into a deeper position following a gentle stroke of Cas’ finger down the back of his neck in a wordless sweet nudge. 

He stayed utterly still, his legs growing restless as Castiel’s rigid sex stayed full and intrusive between his teeth and heavy on his tongue, his lips stretched. Because he wasn’t moving at all, he could feel the faint echo of Cas’ heartbeat through the length of his cock and after several minutes, it began to radiate through Dean. 

After what felt like a half hour, he was painfully hard. The need to  _ move _ clawed at him, as if hangnails had suddenly appeared on all his fingers and he needed to rip them off but couldn’t.

He shifted his legs on the bed, his cock pressing awkwardly towards the mattress, gaining nothing, becoming irritable from an obvious lack of friction. When he tried to reach for it with the hand not trapped beneath him, Cas was quick to grab his wrist.

“I believe I told you not to move.”

_ Fuck.  _ A throaty grumble worked up his windpipe but Cas brushed through his hair and said, “Consider this a lesson in staying put even when things become uncomfortable. I promise you the reward will be worth it.”

Unable to suppress it, he let out a broken desperate whimper and curled his toes, shoving his hips forward and wanting to thrash at the sudden need to have anything stroke his dick. He’d never been so irritable in his life. 

Cas held him in place, just as he’d promised he would. Although, arguably, this wasn’t exactly the situation Dean had been expecting. 

“Relax, you can handle this discomfort. Just like you can handle everything else. Even the fear.”

Dean huffed through his nose and forced his body to release some tension. Except it was like trying to stand on water—fucking impossible. The harder he tried to relax, the more he flinched and felt his nerves fray apart like ragged thread. 

After several minutes, the pressure at the centre of his hips was nearly unbearable. How he managed to turn himself on to such a degree baffled him. The only stimulation was Cas’ stiff unyielding cock rammed into his mouth, nearly blocking his throat. 

But  _ god _ it was good, annoyingly so. Hot and smooth and just  _ there _ . Always  _ there.  _ This angel and his damn metaphors. 

After being tense and squirmy for too long, Dean finally exhausted himself. A peculiar peace moving into place. His erection rested heavy between his legs but he closed his eyes and swallowed around Cas’ cock, accepting that he had nowhere to go. 

At some point, he reasoned with himself, Cas was going to want him to move. It wasn’t like the angel was going to miraculously come without anything else going on. 

“Mmm, that’s what you think,” Cas answered his thought breathlessly.  

The angel’s fingers pressed tight against his head and every muscle in Dean’s body tightened, bracing himself. 

“Wish you knew,” Cas panted, “how good you…  _ mmnghh _ feel in this moment.”

Despite his earlier muffled protests and the insane urge to hump at basically anything, Dean’s mouth watered at the anticipation of Castiel spilling down his throat. 

“Uhhn, Dean,” Cas groaned, his fingers curling. 

As if Dean was the one on the verge of going over, his cock kicked weakly, precome leaking from the tip and slicked over the head to smear on the sheet. 

There was no real warning, other than Cas’ nails biting into his scalp. Warm release spurted to the back of his throat and he swallowed as best he could, some of it spilling out from the corner of his lips. 

Panting through his nose, he sucked Cas through every shudder until the pressure on the back of his head was gone and he pulled up, gasping for a full dose of oxygen. 

“Holy shit,” he sputtered, his voice sounding wet.

Before Dean caught his breath, Cas pushed him onto his stomach. Steady hands gripped and pulled at the plump flesh of his ass, exposing him to the cool air.

His entire body went rigid with anticipation, heart beating thick against the mattress. 

Cas’ stubble scraped over his sensitive skin, abruptly contrasted by the slick glide of Cas’ tongue swiping over the tight ring of muscle. 

Dean spouted a harsh row of curses before ramming his face into the pillow and groaning. It was by far the most unangelic thing they had done so far. 

Shivers crept over his skin. His stomach in knots. Where Cas’ hands gripped his backside he felt as hot as a lit match.

It started slow. Tortuously slow. 

Soft inappreciable licks, followed by broad wet strokes of Cas’ tongue. At times tasting him from his balls all the way to the base of his fucking spine. Dean shook and needed more. Saying sayonara to shame, he pushed back into Cas’ bracing hands, moaning in a pitched sound as he felt Cas’ scruffy face and slick tongue wedged between his cheeks. Caving forward, he dragged his cock against the bed and unwittingly start to rock between the wet and soft sensations, his mind growing foggy.  

Cas’ tongue tormented him with barely there pressure. Flicking and mouthing at him until he was subtly begging, his words uttered against the sheets. “Cas, oh fuck, please… give me…  _ more, _ ” he grated. 

Humid breath puffed against his rim and he clenched, brazenly desperate for Cas to breach him. Cas whispered against him, “Tell me how you feel.”

_ Huh? _ “What… what do you mean?”

“You need to move past your fears, and for that you need to remind yourself that pleasure can always override pain.”

No fucking way; he didn’t buy into that. The words wouldn’t come and he felt his arousal ebb. “Doesn’t work that way,” he said stiffly. 

There was a growl from Castiel and suddenly Dean was yanked back onto his hands and knees, his elbows shaky and weak. He’d barely opened his mouth to ask what the guy was about to do, when his cheeks were roughly handled and a slick tongue jabbed into him, insistent and rapid. His body trembled and weakened. Cas did not hold back and didn’t touch his dick either. 

It wasn’t long before he was lightheaded, his bottom lip shaking and his thighs unsteady beneath his hips. “Cas…” he whimpered, pushing back into the angel’s passionate ministrations.

“Tell me,” he repeated, “or you won’t come.”

“Fuck, Cas… that’s not—”

“ _ Nothing is fair _ ,’ seethed Cas, quickly resuming his wet assault on Dean’s ass. 

The angel’s tongue stroked along his crease and prodded into him, sinking and fluttering.     

Same as before, Dean sensed his orgasm waiting in the wings. Out of reach and close enough to drive him mad. He cursed angrily and yet still pushed his hips backwards. Every please he muttered was ignored. Begging got him nowhere. 

“Okay, okay,” he surrendered, fists clenching the blankets. The entire length of his sex felt swollen and tender, his hips fighting the impulse to cram into the mattress and fuck the shit out of it. But he knew what would save him. Goddamn angel. “It, um, it feels fucking incredible,” he breathed in a long stream, “unbelievably good…”

“Not very descriptive,” observed Cas. 

“Jesus Christ, Cas.” Dean punched the mattress. “I’m no good with words! C’mon, please…” 

Punishment came quick. Cas abruptly stopped, leaving Dean cool and damp. Feeling utterly exposed and ripped off.

“You have to want me more than you fear losing me.”

Dean breathed hard, seething into the shadows beneath his face. “I do,” he gritted out.

“No, you don’t. Because even your embarrassment is winning out over wanting this. You’re incredibly intelligent and you’re very well read. I have no doubt you know the words, you simply don’t want to say them.”

When he’d said yes to Cas the other day, Dean knew it wouldn’t be easy. He just didn’t expect Cas would push him like this. It was ridiculous anyway. Dean was not the wax poetic about passion type. Definitely not when it came to being rimmed and tongue-fucked. 

What was he supposed to say?  _ Your tongue is gloriously wet and inside me and I want to die in this sinful hedonism.   _

No thanks.

Pissed off, Dean got up and grabbed the sheets. He burrowed into the blanket and huffed petulantly until he was settled on his side. His balls were too sore to ignore but goddamn it he was standing his ground. 

Castiel was quiet as he too lay back into bed and gave off an annoyingly calm vibe. 

The seconds ticked by, turning into minutes. Dean ached from his head to his toes, his teeth grating through his decision.

It took fifteen minutes or so before he Dean couldn’t stand the weight of his heart and the tension between his legs. He turned over and curled up into Cas’ side, sighing at the relief in the connection of their skin. 

He spoke in a whisper, eyes downcast despite there being no light. “It felt euphoric,” he started out, “like my whole body was tingling, and every time you, ah, you pushed your tongue into me…” Dean swallowed and shifted uncomfortably. “All I wanted was for you to take me. To feel you… deeper.”

Cas reached out and pulled him into a kiss, where Dean could taste himself on the angel’s lips. It strangely aroused him. The kiss lingered and he melted into it’s familiar pattern. Finally Cas pushed him onto his back, taking his knees and pushing them to the side.

His breath caught as Cas shuffled down and held his sac out of the way, then pressed a damp kiss over his tight hole. 

After having tender enough balls to man up and speak the truth, Castiel’s resumed affection now felt existential. Had him questioning what mattered and what he could live with. 

How Castiel touched him was different too. It was measured and paced, the press of his tongue slow and deliberate, making Dean feel every flutter.

His arousal spread out, pooling deep in his gut and blazing to the ends of his fingers. 

“Cas,” he warned, knowing he was close, unsure if he was allowed.

The angel paused, his breath feeling cool. “Yes, you can,” he replied. 

In quick but steady motions, Cas tongue-fucked him as a warm fist suddenly wrapped around his cock. Dean shuddered and wanted to move in opposite directions, his body needing to split in half to be satisfied.

_ I won’t help you this time or stop you… come when you’re ready. _

Of course he wouldn’t help, right when Dean wanted it most. The dual sensations of Cas’ tongue and the tight circle of his fingers drove Dean towards his orgasm in forking directions. He wanted more of both but couldn’t sacrifice less of either. 

“ _ Cas _ ,” he sobbed, his thighs quaking and his stomach clenching.

_ Let it happen… _

Fuckin’ hell. He was too goddamn keyed up. Agitated, Dean rocked his hips in shallow thrusts, gaining nothing. “Finish me,” he pleaded, “like you did before. Or fuck me… Please, G _ od, _ do something!”

Once again, his demands were ignored and Cas kept on with pushing Dean to the end. It drove him insane with every passing second, until finally he felt the crest of his orgasm barrel down on him.

Dean came with a hoarse shout, his lower lip trembling, tears streaking past his hairline. Sweat damp in every crease. His release spattered against his chest, hitting the underside of his chin and more and more spilled out as he felt his ass squeeze around Cas’ tongue. His fucking tongue! _Fucking_ _Christ…_

“Uhh, my god,” he groaned, aftershocks torquing through his twitchy frame. 

Before he’d settled, Cas climbed on him and took Dean’s face between his palms, kissing him roughly. 

Having Cas’ legs slotted between his thighs meant he felt the hard line of Cas’ sex pressed against his split-slick crease. A moan ripped from his throat, and he broke the kiss. “Fuck me,” he demanded. 

“No.”

“I need you,” he argued.

“I’ve already told you my rules about this. Besides, you’re exhausted and you haven’t slept.”

“So, I hardly ever sleep as it is.”

“And that’s going to change. You gave me control… remember that. It means I won’t have you wearing yourself thin the way you’ve done in the past.”

Dean stated the obvious. “Fine but I won’t be able to sleep.”

“Why don’t we just see about that.”

They cleaned up and fixed the sheets, before crawling back into bed together where Cas sidled up behind him, one arm wrapped around his front, his hand embedded in Dean’s hair. 

Okay, this felt pretty damn awesome. 

And then Cas started to tangle into his short hair, nails scraping gently across his scalp sending shivers rippling down his sated body. 

Dean was asleep before he could argue it wasn’t working. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did you guys have a lickin' good time or what? I swear I will return to the plot shortly. But I hope you enjoyed this smutty interlude.


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My god it's wednesday and look... another chapter. Sadly, I did say we would return to plot, but it's short lived. Porn shall return my dear friends. It's not a long one so perhaps I'll post the next one on Sunday or something. Love ya's

Dean woke with a start, barely asleep more than a half hour. He had no idea what had roused him. But there was Cas, sat up next to him, eyes wide and alert, his smooth chest heaving violently. 

Dean flicked on his bedside light. “What’s wrong?”

In a slow motion, as if Cas wasn’t quite there but still managed to hear Dean’s voice, he turned his head and met Dean’s eyes. “Did you feel it too?”

Searching to the point he became conscious, wondering what had woken up, Dean felt the sweat trickle down his back. “Heat,” he answered, confused. “Like someone had just aimed a torch at my chest.”

“Hm, fascinating.” Cas turned away and tilted his head, staring into space.

“Okay look, man, you’re seriously freaking me out here.”

“It seems you’re feeling what I feel more than I expected.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Dean grabbed Cas’ shoulder and forced the angel to face him.

Blue eyes, stark and fear-struck stared back. “The more I share myself with you, the closer our connection becomes. Of course that’s immaterial at the moment.”

“Uh, alright… I’ll bite.”

Cas squinted, but seemed to get it after a second. “Immense power has just been released. Old, familiar power… but it’s impossible.”

“Goddamn it, if you tell me Amara’s back I fucking quit.”

“No, not her.”

“So who… or, good god,  _ what _ ?”

After a beat of silence, Castiel bit his lip and then said, “God’s creation.”

“Umm, you might wanna narrow that down a smidge.”

“I don’t know. Not something new, something old. Nearly limitless power. Almost as much as Lucifer.”

Dean turned that over and wondered if this was the other shoe dropping or if something else was still to happen. Fucking shoes dropping all over the goddamn place. Just as he opened his mouth to pelt his angel with more, likely unanswerable questions, the door flew open to their room.

Rye stood there, eyes pained, his expression frantic. “Grayson’s gone.”

“Dead?!” 

“Missing.”

In a fluid motion, Cas jumped out of bed stark naked and stormed over to the demon. “Tell me everything.”

Dean bowed his head at the bulging surprise on Rye’s face, worse still when he heard, “Damn… Dean, my man, you want some advil or something?”

“Cas. Clothes. Now.”

Cas shot an impatient look back to him. “Something’s happened,” he said in a hard voice.

“Yeah, I got that. But hey you want me to be honest here, maybe I don’t want everyone we know seeing your junk, alright.”

“Fine.” Cas pointedly glared at him and in an imperceptible flash, the angel was miraculously clothed. “Better?”

“Yes.”

Once Dean was dressed, they marched together to meet up with everyone else. It was chaos. Everyone was talking over each other, but Dean’s focus roamed until he saw Meg off on her own sitting on the floor with her knees drawn up as she chewed her lips. 

He met Cas’ eyes and raised his chin in a clear message for him to go to her. As much as Dean hated how close the two were, he wasn’t  _ that _ much of a jerk. 

Besides, he felt Rye’s phantom questions nudging at the back of his head. Dean turned around. 

“You knew?”

Rye snorted. “Course I did.”

“Anyone else know?”

The demon gestured to Sam. “Your brother’s got a keen eye.”

“Annoyingly so, yeah.” Dean shook his head, but decided there were far more important things to discuss than his and Cas’ now-public relationship. “So what happened?”

“Gray was headed for rounds and grounds, ya know. Check things out as we always do and he was supposed to back by three… we were gonna spar a bit. Guy never showed. I went outside and he was just… gone.”

Shit was now definitely hitting the fan. “How come no one went with him?”

“Man this entire neighbourhood is warded and tricked out like Fort fucking Knox. If something non-human gets within 3 clicks of this place, we know it.”

As he stood and churned over the new info, he felt the room go quiet. Well, no, not entirely quiet. Meg’s harsh sobs filled the space. 

Glancing over, Dean saw her curled up in Cas’ arms and his heart splintered with unbridled affection for the angel. This was the man he’d fallen in love with. Someone who cared for people, for Dean, with such unwavering devotion it was no wonder Dean was terrified to lose him. It wouldn’t be Dean’s loss alone; the whole of the world would be worse off without him. 

Sam was the first to speak up. “Zet, we can’t have anyone else going outside.”

The demon leader scoffed, fury boiling in his expression. “And do  _ nothing _ while a member of my family may be suffering?! May be dead?!”

Kelly moved into the space between both men, her hands resting on her belly. She stared up at Zet. “We can’t afford to lose anyone else.”

“If I want to risk myself, that is my decision,” he told her.

She didn’t look happy at all. “Or,” she spat, “you could be smart about it and not go off and get yourself killed because you’re scared!”

Every one of the demon’s heads snapped in her direction, and Dean felt the air in the room saturate with unease and tension. 

“Hey, hey, everyone.” Dean jumped in, not caring for the hair-standing-on-end feeling. “We’ll figure this out. Everyone’s on edge… but we knew shit was gonna go down. This is only the beginning. Your man Grayson is practically unkillable. So for now… let’s settle our guns and talk it out.”

From the corner of his eye, he saw Cas press a finger to Meg’s forehead and watched her go limp. The angel stood up and met everyone's eyes in turn. 

“Earlier tonight, I felt something… a power akin to Lucifer. I can’t say what it means. But,” he allowed, “I think it’s where we need to start.”

Sam nodded, honing in on an outlet for his skills. “Okay, so we research. What’s got as much power as Lucifer?”

Zet snarled, shaking his head. “Us.”

But Castiel was quick to correct. “No, if anything... even I have more power than you. I may be easier to kill, certainly, but in terms of sheer power… mine exceeds yours.”

Everyone stalled out for a moment, trying to think until Dean huffed a bitter laugh. “Power like Lucifer, huh?”

Narrowed eyes settled on him. 

“Kind of like… an archangel maybe.”

Cas blinked in his direction, his cheek twitched. “There are none left.”

“Michael,” muttered Sam.

_ Exactly _ . Dean nodded at his brother. “Also, we have no idea where angels go when they”—he spared a glance at Cas, feeling nausea swirl in his gut—“when they die.”

“Michael is in the cage. With Rowena gone, there’s no one capable of letting him out.”

“Are you sure?” Eadric asked, his hand brushing through his hair.

They all shared a look, knowing deep down nothing was ever sure in this world. Uncertainty clouded the room and more than ever Dean was reminded how easy it was to lose someone. As he peeked over at Meg’s form, curled on the carpet, he couldn’t imagine her pain. 

Actually… no, he could. He had. He would again.

In a murmur of sound, Dean felt more than heard everyone devise a course of action but all he could do was stare at Meg. He wanted to look at Cas, but he felt like he’d be looking at a ghost. Before he knew it, he was crossing the length of the room in robotic strides. 

He bent down and picked her up, her tiny body tucked into his arms and pressed against his chest. As he passed by everyone again, he mumbled to Sam, “Gonna bring her to another room.”

Surely not this one, he thought, and definitely not the one she’d spent with Grayson all these years. Since Dean had been spending every night since with Cas, he went back to his old room and settled her on his bed.

She looked fragile, more so than he ever thought possible. He used to hate her, and now he saw himself. Pain and grief and loss.

John Winchester’s voice echoed in the back of his mind, shouting at him to sac up and go back to help the others with the current problem. He decided he was needed here more. 

Two hours passed before her eyes fluttered open. In one second, before she remembered, she looked confused about her surroundings. When she saw him, agony gripped her and she screamed. 

The scream tore through the room, probably echoed through the halls and he let her. He felt it with her. 

When she ran out of air, she wheezed. Tears angrily pushed beyond the corner of her eyes. “I will kill whoever took him,” her voice cut the air like ice.

Dean unemotionally met her fierce fixed stare. “I’ll help you.”

It wasn’t what she expected, her eyes narrowing, the hurt being nudged out of the way by confusion. “They won’t let us leave.”

“Small hurdles,” he told her.

Her dark red lips curled into a devious grin. “You and me, huh.”  

Dean smirked back. “Go figure.”

 

They waited until everyone was preoccupied, counting the minutes as the hours passed, biding their time. Dean knew it was stupid, in a far corner of his mind. But somehow, her anger had become his. It was impossible to think clearly past the rage. Their compiled fear and pain fed off each other.

When Cas was off hitting angel radio and the others deep into research, all of them thinking Dean was simply helping Meg out, they forged their escape. 

She knew where the weapons were, and they stocked up. A bag each, hexbag too, and took back ways she knew of to get them out without being caught. Dean didn’t fully believe they’d make it out, not until his feet hit the grass and they were running across the lawn.

By nightfall, they were parking a stolen pickup outside a Motel 8. 

When they wound up in the motel room, notes spread out on the table, the real planning begin. He told her everything he knew, and about his suspicions regarding Michael. 

Her lip curled. “I fucking knew it.”

“But Cas said no one could get him out… maybe that’s true.”

“Please,” she patronized. “You think Rowena was the only talented witch around. Get your head out of your ass Dean. There are thousands of witches. Even if none of them exactly matched her power, two of them could. With witches, there are always power in numbers and come on, those bitches are as power hungry as everyone else. What do you think they’d do if they heard about Kelly’s bun in the oven.”

“No shit,” he acknowledged. “You think Michael would team up with the bad guys, though?”  

She huffed. “How long were you tortured, Dean?” His lack of response made the point. “Exactly. Barely a day, sweetheart… I mean, really. And our poor archangel has been getting shanked and flayed and toyed with for nearly an era. Besides, that baby is his shot at getting rid of Lucifer for good.”

Dean pressed his lips together. “Ours too, ya know.”

“Don’t be stupid. Kelly won’t let that baby anywhere near good ol’ dad.”

Glossing over the conversation, he looked for a plan of action. “We go lookin’ for witches then.”

“No,” she sneered, “we go hunting for witches.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I miss Meg.


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soooo so sorry about the late posting of this chapter. Work was insane last week and then I ended up having unreliable internet access over the weekend. Here it is! Again, so sorry! And fair warning, next chapter is just all PORN lol. But as you can... there is plot happening as well because I can't help myself. :) 
> 
> Love you's xoxoxox

Castiel’s strange comment came back to him days later as he and Meg had finished interrogating a particularly violent witch and her witchy man-friend. They had another name to go on for now, but Dean couldn’t focus on it. 

It was hard to explain, but he felt anger stewing inside him. Not what he’d been feeling before, but something else. 

Then he remembered. Cas had said something about the stronger their connection the more they could feel each other. 

Hmm. Evidently, Cas was pissed.

No big surprise there, but Dean let his guilt swim through his veins and sit heavy in his chest, hoping Cas would understand… begging him to understand. This needed to be done. 

It was basically a hunt, at the end of the day. Nothing worse than he and Sam had done before. 

 

Half a day later, he and Meg got somewhere. 

On the heels of a witch named Rune, they thought they’d gotten the jump on her when the tables turned and she sent them both flying back down the alley, their bones crunching to the pavement with jolts of radiating pain. His gun flying out of his hand. 

The witch laughed. “Oh, such anger and pain from the both of you.”

Meg’s eyes went black. She burst to her feet and shot towards the witch full-tilt. “Where is he!?” she screamed, black smoke seeming to diffuse out of her skin giving a whole new meaning to blood-boiling rage.

Hurting everywhere and then some, Dean took the calmer approach. He rose to his feet and picked up his discarded gun, checking to make sure the safety was off. 

“Straight to the point here lady,” he said, striding up to her, muzzle straight as an arrow, “have you been to hell in the past couple weeks or what?”

The witch snickered, catching his eye. Meg was only a couple feet from impact. With a quick toss of the woman’s bony hand, Meg’s forward motion was halted as if she’d run into a wall. 

“Perhaps,” the witch replied, a devious taunting grin perking the corner of her mouth.

Meg flung curses in the air, struggling but unable to move. Dean walked forward, amazed to still be on his feet. It was clear the witch didn’t seem him as a threat. Shit, maybe he wasn’t. Maybe he was walking straight on till death. But so long as he could help Meg, he would. 

Tension straining his jaw, he spoke, “Spring anyone loose?”

“Perhaps.” The same response again; a taunting echo. 

A few more steps and Dean was standing beside Meg. They exchanged a look. Her black eyes to his green ones, both of them feeling as if they hit the jackpot but not daring to hope. 

“Something with wings, maybe,” Dean edged out. 

At that she cackled, as if something was utterly hilarious. But then he knew. The alleyway they were in seemed to shrink, shadows filling space and erasing daylight. The witch began to glow and glow. Sharp white against a sea of black. 

Meg screeched in pain beside him, her eyes glued shut. 

There was a crack of lightning and then wings, dark and full, splashed out into the background, blindsiding him into a sudden state of shock.

_ Oh fuck... _

“Michael...” he muttered, barely hearing his own voice. Dean’s heart hammered inside his chest, a long forgotten fear sinking back into his bones.

The witch— _ No _ , the angel, tilted his head, giving Dean an alien stare. “Yes. That was my name, wasn’t it?”

Fucking hell, it wasn’t just Michael, scary enough as that would be… it was Hell-made delusional Michael. Fresh with the crazy and indisputably more terrifying.

Dean reached out blindly and grabbed Meg’s arm. “We need to go,” he frantically told her, “we need to go right the fuck now.” 

Before he had a clue even how to make it out of there alive, the rumble of the Impala rose to his ears, a peeling sound screeching through the dark. Rousing in him a mix of relief and fear. 

Rye instantly appeared by his side, Cas on his other and Sam running up behind, a flaming bottle held in his grip. His baby brother’s deep shout bounced between the brick walls, “Everyone down!!”

Castiel’s hand slammed down on Dean’s back, shoving him to the pavement and knocking the wind clear out of his lungs. Rye crouched to his right, fingers clawed against the earth—his eyes gone dark, a sound pouring from his lips that Dean had never heard from a monster before. Not quite a growl, but something sharper and waaaay the hell creepier. 

A blast of heat blew their hair back and warmed their skin. The crackle of flames chased the cloud of smoke. Dean opened his eyes and tried to push up.

“Don’t fucking move,” Cas snapped. 

He swallowed and went still. His heart thudded erratically for a solid minute, wondering how the hell he and Meg had been found, but pretty damn grateful for it. When the dust settled, he felt Cas let up and finally got his legs under him. 

Meg was screaming at Cas as soon as the angel’s focus left Dean. “Fuck you, Clarence! Fuck you and your entire goddamn species!” Wet streaks poured from her still-black eyes. 

“Meg, please,” he approached her. 

“No.” She backed up. “We were fine,” she said, her voice thready, “before you fucking set Lucifer free and before you showed up and before you were born! You deserve to die! All of you!” she screamed again, her chin pushing up, lips spread wide until black smoke rose out of her in a funnel to the clouds.

Before her vacated body hit the ground, Sam caught it and hoisted the limp form into his arms. He traded a look with Dean. The man’s disappointment was clear in the flat set of his lips. 

Dean watched his brother bring her to the car, wondering if she’d ever return. When he chanced a look to Cas, he saw the angel shift his eyes away. He expected anger, but instead he saw nothing. No single emotion marked his features. 

That worried Dean far more than anything else. 

Cas walked back to the car without a word. Dean closed his eyes briefly and finally turned to Rye. The demon was twitching inhumanly, anger pouring from him. 

“I’m sor—”

Air rushed by and Dean’s back slammed against wall, his breath catapulted from his lungs for the second time in all of five minutes. Rye’s hard forearm was rammed under Dean’s jaw, his body weight lifted off the ground, chin forced up. The coarse brick scraped the back of his head. Dean winced and forced himself to meet the demon’s eyes.

“Let me make this perfectly clear,  _ friend _ . Grayson was taken, and no one here is to blame for that… but  _ Meg.  _ Meg is my family too and if your actions cause anything to happen to her, I will fucking obliterate you.”

“Rye,” he pleaded. “I just wanted to help her, man.”

He growled. “Does she seem helped to you?!”

“How the hell could we have known Michael would be—”

“You couldn’t have known,” he stated. “Exactly.”

All the fight in Dean deflated, he knew his arguments were baseless. He knew leaving had been wrong. He’d known as soon as he’d left the base. But at the time, all he could see was a future and a present blended together. Ghosts everywhere, anger and grief without limit. 

The bracing pressure under his head vanished and he crumpled to the ground, dredging up every last ounce of energy to get to his feet. 

The drive back to the demon’s base was the quietest few hours of his life. 

Everyone was pissed. Meg was gone. Michael was temporarily out of the way but not for long. A crazy version of Michael had returned from Hell and they were fucking screwed. 

By the time the Impala parked outside and they marched monotonously inside, Dean was certain he wouldn’t be welcome in Cas’ bed anymore. He’d pushed too far and he’d broken a promise. Actually, no. It had been more of a vow. No wonder Cas had gone blank, why the hell would the guy keep going out of his way to fix Dean when it was clear he simply wasn’t relationship material. Sometimes people were just broken, unfixable. Sometimes those people were Dean.

Wow.

Accepting the truth hurt like a bastard. Like, he’d always kind of known, but really understanding he was irreparably broken in some way was a definite blow to the psyche. 

He started to turn for his door, not even aware of where everyone was around him; if they even were. 

“Where do you think you’re going?”

Dean paused, hand stretched out in the aborted action of turning the handle. “To my room.”

“One day you will understand,” said Cas. Abruptly, Dean was pushed face-first into the door where Cas wrenched his arms behind his back, hard enough to drag a hiss of pain from him. “You will not speak unless I say. You will not move unless I say.”

Fearful of Cas’ wrath, he didn’t budge a fucking muscle.

“Are we understood? Answer.”

“Y-yes.”

“Good. Now, walk.”

Jerked around and manhandled, Cas guided him down the hall. When they reached Castiel’s door, they didn’t stop. Feet shuffling uncertainly down the remainder of the hall. His heart-rate shot up and he felt a growing unease tickle his nerves. 

Dean heard the jangle of keys and saw Cas open a door from his peripheral vision. Before he got to see what was inside, Cas spun him around and met his face. Dean had never seen the angel’s eyes so crystal clear, so intense. 

He wanted to look away before the moment seared in his mind.

“Yes or no answers, Dean… nothing else.”

Feeling repentant and low on self-worth, he nodded. 

“Do you regret leaving?”

“Yes.”

“Did you leave because you wanted to help Meg? Think about it before you answer.”

Dean chewed the inside of his cheek, but he didn’t need to think about it. “No.”

“You left because you saw her pain, took it as your own, and lost control.”

God only knew what Cas would do if he pointed out that he hadn’t asked a question. Instead he swallowed and admitted the truth. “Yes.”

“Now, this is not a question… look at me.”

Steeling himself for the vivid reality of a man he cared for beyond comprehension, he raised his eyes and saw fierce blue glaring back at him. Anger there, but love too. Love that had no limits, that would exist even when nothing else did. 

The unnerving intensity of the moment resonated, trembling down his spine. He wanted to fall to his knees and be worthy of a love like that. 

He opened his mouth, but saw Cas’ eye twitch and instead swallowed whatever useless excuse sat on his tongue. 

“If I asked you not to close your eyes to me ever again, could you?”

He didn’t hesitate. “Yes.”

For a long moment, Cas studied him, searching for what Dean wasn’t sure. The angel’s hand reached out and cupped his cheek. “You want to see me?”

Dean sighed in relief, his body sagging. “ _ Yes _ .” God, he wanted to be with Cas more than he wanted to live. He needed to know Cas wasn’t a ghost. 

“Good. Then I know you won’t like this.”

Panic hit him like a cold wind and the world went black. 

“Cas!?” he threw his hands out but couldn’t see them. Couldn’t see anything. All he knew was the air against his skin and the carpet beneath his boots. “What did you do?”

“I didn’t say you could speak,” Cas reminded him, but answered anyway, “But to your question… I  _ temporarily _ removed your sight.”

He looked around, searching the blackness for even a flicker of light or shape. There was nothing. He felt trapped inside himself. This wasn’t a blindfold or his eyes crammed shut. It was evasive and total. 

He wanted to beg Cas for forgiveness but knew it wasn’t what the angel wanted to hear. An old memory of Bobby came to mind then, the burly man sassing at Dean to stop yakking and get to it! The old man’s version of the adage: Actions speak louder than words. Wise man, that one. Fuck, Dean wished he were still around. 

Descending into a state of singular purpose, Dean bowed his head and fell to his knees. Hardly feeling the impact reverberate up his bones. From there, he tipped his head back knowing without question he was looking straight at Cas and that Cas was staring right back. 

There were endless ways to surrender to someone. To submit to them. For Dean, it would happen again and again. Learning how to love someone the way they deserved to be loved wasn’t an easy task, not for someone who’d spent his life running from the emotion.

And he still ran. But he wasn’t now. He was here… with Cas. Not a ghost or a future horror but in a real, present moment he wouldn’t dare waste.  

He felt the way his knees pressed to the floor, imagined himself anchoring to it, making roots in pitch black solitude. 

His jaw fell open when Cas’ fingers brushed his cheek and sank past his hairline, curling around to the back of his head. Dean pressed into the touch, craving it. 

“I will always take you back,” said Cas, his voice tender and soft. “Don’t ever think I don’t feel or see the struggle waging inside you. But you can’t keep it up forever. It will destroy you. Always remember, there are worse things than grief.”

Dean turned his head to let Cas’ touch find new territory. He waited for the end of Cas’ lesson. 

“There is regret. And believe me… regret is worse. It is one thing to have happy memories taken from you… it’s certainly another to have any hope of happiness taken. To be robbed of a chance.”

Dean knew the truth of the words. For all the times he’d thought Cas was gone to him forever, the regret had driven him to severe depths of alcoholism. All the moments he would never have. 

But now he could, if he let himself. If he let Cas in...

Through the silence, Dean knew Castiel was asking him a silent question. Even though Cas had demanded a single yes from him already… he was giving Dean choice. They could move forward to whatever future together, full of love and kink and probably a lot of misunderstandings. 

But Dean had to accept. For Cas to feel certain and for Dean to continually remind himself of the things that truly mattered. 

There on his knees, feeling the angel’s absolute love and affection, he reached up and gently guided Cas’ palm to his lips. He pressed a lingering kiss to it; giving the angel a tender silent yes. 

After a moment, Cas took his hand and pulled him to his feet, leading him into the unknown room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is there really anything better than Dean on his knees in front of Castiel?! I mean really.


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You guys ready for like a billion words of porn... here ya go! Not beta'd. Kinks include: restraints, spanking, fingering, buttplug, oral sex, gag, edging. 
> 
> Wow... I really got a bunch in there didn't I. 
> 
> Also... if sweet love-making (sort of... no actual intercourse) is considered a kink, then add that one in there too!

Closed within an impervious wall of blackness, Dean followed Cas into whatever space awaited them. In the back of his addled mind, he knew exactly where they were. One of the few rooms Dean had heard of but hadn’t dared to go and find. Not like he’d had a use for it before.

A room where things happened. Fun things…  _ dirty _ things. Kinky things. 

He swallowed a lump of nerves and wasn’t sure if he was excited for Cas’ take on what Dean’s punishment would be for leaving or whether he was fucking thrilled to know Cas loved him beyond the angel’s better sense. 

All he focused on was Cas’ fingers tight in his grasp and the shuffle of his feet, shoving back the tension inherent of worrying whether he’d bump into furniture at any second. 

They came to a stop. Dean turned his head to one side and then the other… as if he could see. As if he knew what awaited him. Instead there was nothing. 

Cas’ hand slipped free of his grasp and his lips parted with a half-formed protest that died before it came out. He was determined to be the picture of remorse and submission.

Those long-established hunter-born senses gave him the distinct impression Cas was moving about the room, arranging or preparing whatever. But the angel was eerily quiet and it was hard to keep his mouth shut when five minutes turned into ten. 

After a while he started to wonder if he’d been left alone. Relegated to some infantile time-out. It would be less than he deserved, but he desperately hoped it wasn’t the case. 

He let out a sigh through his nose and started to clench his jaw. Determined flares of anger rose under his skin at the lack of attention but he beat it back down. All those long years he spent ignoring what they had, he could withstand a little forced solitude for another blip of time if that’s what it took. 

Cas’ voiced command rose from the dark, a deep coarse presence on the air, “Undress.”

After nearly twenty minutes of nothing, he almost couldn’t comprehend the instruction. Painfully aware of his instilled blindness and how strangely vulnerable it made him, Dean started to peel off the layers. Undoing every button with shaky hands. Tugging his undershirt over his head and gasping as the naked breath of air touched his skin. 

It wasn’t too cold, thankfully. If anything, the room was on the close side of hot. Of course, that could easily be his imagination. 

He toed off his boots and heard them clunk against something nearby as they settled. 

Inhaling sharply, Dean shucked his boxers and pants in one swift move and kicked them to the side. He straightened his spine and looked ahead, having no idea if wherever he was looking was even in the vicinity of Cas’ location. 

But he had a feeling; deep in the centre of his elusive senses. 

Out of the darkness and isolation came the sudden trail of a finger down the centre of his chest. Dean barely moved as Cas traced a pattern across his skin, skimming his flesh and subjecting him to a perpetual wave of flinching muscles. 

It was a feat to keep his breathing paced, but he’d be damned if he was going to fall apart as quickly as he had before. Some day he needed to learn how to let Cas love him without falling apart at the seams. 

Maybe today. Though… considering he was naked, blind, and in a sex room with Cas, he doubted it. 

“Come with me.” Cas took his hand same as he had before, guiding him to the left and further ahead. 

As they crossed over the carpeted space, Dean started to feel the true effects of being without sight. No sense of space or direction left him feeling buoyant and adrift, no way to anchor back to his surroundings. And ultimately… to Cas. No way to know if the angel was real or ghost anymore.

Fear prickled at the back of his neck, but he had to trust reality. Trust the feel of Cas’ skin against his fingers.  

As they came to a halt maybe only a few feet from where they’d been, Cas’ rough voice broke the silence, coming from inches away. “To your left is a bed. Get on it… lie on your back.”

Breaking contact with Cas wasn’t easy, but he managed. Moving a step to the side, his leg bumped into the plush side of the bed… he felt down for the surface and adjusted so he’d fall back onto it without missing and crashing to the floor. 

It wasn’t like the other beds in the base. It swallowed him. Blankets and pillows by the dozens were everywhere. A kind of fluffy chaos. He wanted to laugh, but all that came out was a weird delirious sigh. He stretched out, throwing his hands back—

Where he was immediately grabbed by Cas and held there. “Relax, Dean.”

He tried, but registering the smooth restraints snapping around his wrists did very much the opposite. Shivers raced across his skin and he bit his lip to smother whatever traitorous sound tickled the back of his throat. 

Cas’ fingers vanished from his skin. Immediately, almost instinctively, Dean tested the slack and found there to be practically none. He could hardly put an inch between his hands let alone yank them back. Although, if he were desperate, he could drag his weight up using the binds as leverage but—

_ Fuck.  _

Cas was by his legs now, pushing his thighs apart, then taking one leg at a time and dragging it to a far corner of the bed. Dean’s flexibility being severely tested. In careful loops of rope, Cas secured him in place.

A hard breath escaped his lungs and he tried not to think of how he must look. Not just on display, but a goddamned offering. He wasn’t against serving himself up to Cas; fuck, he was all for it. But wanted something didn’t mean your nerves were on board with the situation. 

“You know what you did was wrong,” Cas said. “That you made an irresponsible decision and left all of us to worry. Further, you put yourself and Meg in danger because of your own fears. Substantiated or not.”

There was no denying Dean’s fears had evidence piled up to the rafters but definitely not the time to point it out. 

“There are plenty of ways I could punish you,” continued Cas. “However, I’m worried you’ll like them all.” Dean listened to Cas’ words and waited, a sharp tension settling into his gut. “I think the best thing... is to deny you an orgasm.”

At first, Dean thought he was okay going without release. But then he noticed the ache in his muscles already and wasn’t sure how long he could withstand being drawn tight over and over. Not getting off was one thing… not getting off after an hour or more of whatever Cas would do to him sounded impossible.  

But he would try. With a subtle gesture, he dipped his chin in acceptance of his punishment. 

“If you need me to stop, pray.” 

With those words, Dean felt a slip of fabric sink between his lips, his tongue wetting the gag. The bind of fabric was tightened, leaving his mouth parted, his voice muffled.

Castiel stroked his bare skin in rough swipes. Warm palms and fingers gliding over him. Down the length of his arms, over his rising chest, nails scratching over his clenching abdomen, then detouring out towards his wide-spread legs.  

The angel’s deft fingers gripped the meat of his thighs so hard it pinched. Dean panted against the stretch of fabric and tried to tense up against the restraints as he felt Cas’ touch inch north into the vee his legs. 

His balls were caressed, fondled, tugged at a little. But Dean could handle it all so far. He was pleasantly hard; a heavy sensation at the juncture of his hips. Cas’ fingers curled around his sex and started to slide over him. One pump, then another. And then gone. 

Dean tried to chase the touch, canting his hips up into the air but he knew it was useless. 

Sighing with relief, Cas’ touch returned to his skin. Nothing but the weight of a hand braced on Dean’s thigh. 

On some level, Dean expected what came next. The cool slick presence of a finger nudging between his asscheeks. His cock kicked wantonly, depsite being ignored. As Cas teased his rim in sinful wet strokes, Dean started to breathe heavy against the gag. 

“Your heart is racing…” noted Cas, sounding amused. 

Dean wanted to swear but grumbled his irritation instead—the ragged sound choked out the moment Cas pushed past the ring of muscle and slid into his body. It was impossible not to roll his hips, chasing greater friction but no amount of movement gave him relief. 

In slow taunting motions, Cas withdrew and nudged back in. One single digit feeling him up. After five minutes Dean growled and jerked at the restraints, starving for more. Goddammit, he  _ needed _ more. 

When he finally stowed his shame and muffled a broken, “Please” through the gag, Cas moaned and granted him another finger. Pumping both digits into the tight entrance of Dean’s body, scissoring and curling them forward. 

Dean rocked with the subtle motion of Cas’ exertions, trying desperately to ignore the rise of heat and tension in the pit of his stomach. His erection hovered over his lower abdomen, a perpetual rigid weight, occasionally leaking precome to his skin.

It was easy to lose track of time after that and before he knew it, Cas had closed a fist around Dean’s cock and started to jerk him with obvious purpose. It was as if Dean was abruptly snapped out of a trance. He felt the tight enclosure of Cas’ hand like a brand and the swift thrust of Cas’ fingers relentlessly driving into him. There was nothing slow or taunting about this. Dean was being pushed and pushed. 

His orgasm pressed forward, like a surge rising from deep within. He knew it was coming, felt the rush of blood and the bottled pressure at the juncture of his hips. Euphoria so close he jerked his hips up violently, only to have the entirety of Cas’ touch disappear. 

Before he took his next breath, the angel danced his fingers down the inside of Dean’s foot, and  _ holy fuck—No.  _ Dean bit off a curse against the gag and engaged every muscle he possessed in a poor attempt to yank his foot away. 

Fucking restraints made sure he couldn’t escape it.

Being tickled at the crux of release was probably the worst kind of feeling Dean had ever known. All the built up pressure at the base of spine died off, his nerves rebelling at the change of plans. He felt cold and hot all at once, sure as anything Cas would have a hell of a hard time getting him that close again. 

A half hour later, he was proved wrong. Thirty solid minutes of Castiel slowing stroking his cock brought him to a whimpering pathetic state. He writhed against the mattress, limbs forcibly stretched out. 

The gag was drenched in his spit, his voice thick and hoarse. Every curse and plea muffled. 

Cas’ fist dragged up his shaft, looped slowly over the head of Dean’s cock and worked the dribble of precome back over his length. All he managed to comprehend was the predictable rise and squeeze and heat of Cas’ touch. Unnervingly slow. 

But it worked. Fucking christ, did it ever. His orgasm surged again, faster this time. As if his body knew it better get down to business. 

Same as before, the stroking stopped and the tickling strangled his impending release. Dean groaned and pulled at the restraints. This time, Cas didn’t start back up again, not yet. Instead, the angel let him take a breath and settle his rampant heart. 

“How are you liking your punishment so far?” Castiel, a hint of selfish enjoyment tainting his voice. 

Dean wanted to glare daggers at him. Wanted to swear too. Unfortunately, it was hard to do either when sight and words were compromised. Dammit, he fucking tried though. 

“Hmm,” Cas trailed a finger up his leg. “That good, I see. Are you sure you can take it? I’m nowhere near done with you.”

Nowhere near done? Jesus. Dean wasn’t sure how long he could go without breaking apart. Every nerve felt raw already. But fuck if he wasn’t stubborn as all hell. Grinding his back teeth and biting into the wet gag, he gave a hard nod.

“Alright. Let’s get a little more intense then.”

Fuckin’ hell. Dean immediately regretted throwing out such an arrogant stubborn response. It was a moment’s wait before he knew what Cas meant. 

Pressing into the crease of his ass was a broad slick toy. 

“Fh‘uck,” Dean muttered, trying to relax his muscles. Cas pushed until the wide head of it nudged at his rim. There, the angel twisted and slid the thing around, spreading lube all around between his cheeks. 

“I quite like having you at my mercy,” Cas commented, a sure smile curving his lips. 

Dean would’ve smirked if he could, instead he shamelessly rubbed himself against the toy. 

“Oh, you want this inside you I imagine?” Highlighting his words, Cas pressed the slick toy against him… pushing just enough to drive him mad. 

Fuck decency right to hell. Dean nodded, a desperate groan chasing the action. 

“But you know I won’t let you finish.”

A whimper, both in protest and desperation rose up his throat. “Don’t care,” he shot back, the words mangled. 

“You will.”

Cas’ sinful promise hung in the air as the angel worked the toy into Dean. Twisting and moving in shallow thrusts, Dean eventually felt the full stretch of it settle into his body, the end tapering until his breath caught as he realized Cas had shoved a plug into him. 

He squirmed as much as he could, unable to avoid the sheer existence of it. Arousal spiked through his limbs, rushing into his gut where he felt fire building deep and low. 

It was maddening enough to feel the constant stretch and unavoidable presence, but worse when Cas’ hot damp mouth sealed around his cock and the angel started to suck Dean off with the kind of fervor and rapid pace Dean had rarely seen outside of a porn flick.

Moans poured from his chest, his ass clenching around the smooth intrusion as he jerked his hips towards Cas’ throat.  The binds prevented his ability to move with any real influence. All the while, Cas hummed around his shaft, tongued at his slit and swallowed in a tight constriction around his dick. 

Dean thought he was going to fire off like a rocket this time. No amount of tickling would dampen the rush of it. Not this time. He started to shake, moaning in a desperate rumble of broken sound, his hips rolling back and forth. The stiff plug shifted infinitesimally against his prostate.

Imminent release roared through his veins, every muscle seizing up. He was going to come.

“Cas!” he yelled, jerking his arms against the restraints. Metal chains clinked above his head.

But he didn’t need to warn the angel. No release came, not a single drop of come. Cas cupped his sac and Dean felt the the same sharp cutoff he had before.

Fucking angel powers. 

Instant tears sprung to his eyes. After three rises and no relief Dean was reeling. It was weak and pathetic. He should be able to endure more. It was just sex. Or so he told himself. But nothing about Cas was “just” anything. 

Dean felt Cas’ hands frame his face, a gentle stroke of a thumb over the rise of his cheek. Tear tracks getting smudged out. 

“Take a breath Dean. Nice and deep.”

Hearing Cas’ voice pulled him back a fraction he sucked back air around the wet fabric in his mouth. A shiver rippled over his skin and he found it odd because every inch felt like it was on fire. 

“Another,” instructed Cas.

Dean filled his chest a second time, letting his ribs expand and contract. He settled, moderately, but he was still shuddering and didn’t expect it would stop any time soon. 

“I want to give you your sight back now… is that okay?”

An excited pitched moan saturated the air, more of a yes than his muffled utterance of the word that came after.

Cas grazed a finger down his forehead and between his eyes, ending at the tip of his nose. In a blinding burst of sensory overload, Dean could see. At first, only blurry bright shapes. Then it cleared. 

What he thought was bright at first, was barely more than a lazy glow. 

The ceiling above him wasn’t bland and impersonal as he’d imagined it would be. Instead it was painted a dark navy, decorated with swaths of drapey white cloth and the tiniest of twinkle lights. Christ, it was like being in a disney fairytale. Granted, a rather x-rated fairytale, but still.

Peeling his eyes away from the unimportant details of the strangely romantic kink room, he looked further down the bed and saw Cas on his knees between Dean’s sluttily splayed legs. 

The angel was gloriously naked, the subtle glow of lights warm against his skin. Comfortable in his nudity the way no human would be. His depthless blue eyes rested on Dean, a calm presence of admiration softening his features. 

Dean swallowed. A sliver of panic tightened his chest but wasn’t enough to distract him. Not when he had Cas to focus on. 

“Now,” Cas said, sounding stern, “just because your eyes are open doesn’t mean we’re going to have intercourse.” Dean huffed a laugh at the term. “I don’t believe either of us is ready for that.”

As much as he wanted to beg for it, protest how very ready he was, Dean was far too gone to be rational and they both knew it. Deep down, he knew Cas was right. 

“Your punishment isn’t quite over yet, Dean. I know you’re struggling… but we both know you can handle it. All you have to remember is to let go, to trust me. You won’t get to come, but I won’t leave you and I will take care of you.”

Every trepidation died on his tongue and he felt a strange peace wash over him. He met Cas’ gorgeous blue eyes and didn’t move. Castiel studied him for a moment, eyes narrowing in thought. 

“Very good,” he praised Dean, running a soothing hand along the inside of Dean’s thigh. 

Cas gave a little tug on the toy buried in Dean’s ass, earning a startled gasp as Dean realized he’d forgotten about it. 

“I’m going to undo some of your restraints... And when you can move, I want you to come to me and lay yourself out over my lap. Face down.”

The image struck him and he knew where this was going. Dean shot Cas an uncertain look.

“Yes, I’m going to spank you. Twenty hits for making me worry.”

Fuck. Eyes wide, Dean worried about several things at once. Liking it, not liking it. Wondering how stupid he’d look.

Cas frowned and crowded over him, one palm cradling Dean’s jaw. “You look breathtaking. Always.  _ Never _ forget that or question it.”

He wished he could lick his lips, or look away from the intensity but he simply gazed back and tried to see whatever it was Cas saw in him. 

“Your strength,” Cas answered his thought, reaching over to undo a couple clasps. “Your determination to help others, your infallible resistance to corruption. No matter how uncertain your chances are… you always persist.”

Dean would’ve snorted if he wasn’t so mesmerized by Cas’ words. Was he really these things? Were those traits better than his faults? 

The pull on his arms loosened and he realized he was free. Mostly. His wrists were still bound but no longer tied to the bed itself. 

Cas shifted down his body, laying kisses to his skin along the way. Dean gave the angel a sheepish mangled smile against the gag. He felt exposed in ways he’d never been before. As if his true self had been buried deep all this time, disappearing the moment his childhood was robbed from him, only to return know. Coaxed back to life under the guidance of an angel. 

With a snap on one side, then the other, Dean’s legs were freed too. He watched Cas move to sit at the end of the bed. 

Waiting. 

Dean moved to sit up only to hiss at the reminder of the plug still slotted between his cheeks. From there on, he shifted gingerly to the edge of the mattress, praying Cas wasn’t planning to leave it in him for what was coming. 

Finding it easier to rise to his feet, he did. Knees shaking, Dean took a quick scan of the room. It didn’t present the way he thought a kinky room should. Sure there was a wall of tools, a couple tables, specific chains and instruments bolted to the walls, the ceiling. But there was a softness to it he definitely hadn’t expected.  

Dean glanced down at his cock, still stubbornly hard. He bit down on the gag and met Castiel’s eyes briefly before awkwardly laying himself out over the man’s thighs. The angel’s stiff cock prodded Dean in the hip. Unable to help himself, he grinded against it.

“None of that,” Cas reprimanded, giving a yank of his hair. 

With a huff, Dean went stiff as a board, exhilarated and terrified all the same. 

“Are you ready?”

Fuck. Who was ever ready for this? Dean grunted a sound through the gag and gave an indicative wiggle of his ass, reminding Cas of the plug. 

The angel frigging laughed at him. A low throaty, downright sexy, laugh. “Oh no,” he said, “that’s staying right where it is.”

Dean couldn’t hold back a whimper but he’d damn well wasn’t about to bow out either. He went still and waited. Fine. It would be fine. 

The first slap was quick, a sharp sound in the room. Not too hard, but enough for him to feel the sting. The following three were in rapid succession, one cheek, the other, and across the crease of his ass. The plug getting roughly jostled, his insides squeezing around it. 

“F’huck,” he wheezed, his body spasming in reflexive little jerks. 

His next breath caught on the inhale as Cas smacked him a fifth time. Definitely harder. The entire curve of his one cheek stung, burning. The skin itching like mad. 

After that Cas didn’t give him any breaks. 

Dean lost count. Everything faded to a blur. Only the hot sting kept his attention, the sudden jerk of the plug in his ass.

Before Cas finished, Dean’s emotions tripped over the wire. A floodgate of need clamouring over his better sense. Utterances of  _ please _ and  _ fuck _ slid past the gag, every hard consonant choked out with zero precision.

It didn’t take long before he couldn’t even do that. All concept of reality slid through his fingers. Dean knew tears were squeezing out of the corners of his eyes, his lashes sticking wetly together. 

With each smack, he cried out and felt the entire build up of the night surge to a breaking point. Arousal suffocated him, until he couldn’t feel anything but an indescribable blend of irritation of euphoria. 

He floated into a boundless sensation of calm. It surrounded him, making everything that had always been wrong feel suddenly right somehow. Like dirt being cleared from glass. Wrinkles smoothed out of fabric. 

On some level, he knew Cas was done. Felt the smooth gentle touch of Cas’ fingers running over his red, sensitive skin. He shook under Cas’ hands, resting his cheek against the bed and wanted to be nowhere else but in that moment with Cas. 

Dean flinched when Cas’ fingers closed around the base of the plug and started to twist it out of him. He hitched a breath and stuttered a weak moan of protest. He didn’t even know what he was protesting anymore. 

He just wanted. Needed. 

Hungry for things only Cas could give him, feelings and sensations only the angel was capable of pulling out of him. 

“You’re perfect,” Cas whispered. The angel’s free hand drifted to Dean’s hair, fingers threading into the sweat-damp strands.

It felt beyond incredible. He tilted his head towards the touch, wincing as Cas tugged the toy completely out.

“Once more, nice and slow.”

Dean wasn’t quite sure what he meant, having zero brain capacity left to think with any degree of intelligence. But then he felt two slick fingers push into his ass and he sucked in a breath through shaky lips. 

_ Cas… _

“Do you want me to stop?”

Dean shook his head, eyes feeling heavy. _No._ _God no… keep touching me._

“As you wish…”

Those three words were potent, drawing Dean back to old memories. Cas diligently worked Dean closer to climax. His talented fingers twisted, pressing and thrusting. Assaulting his prostate with near constant touch. The angel’s other hand scratching over Dean’s scalp, making him delirious. 

Pleasure surrounded him in two extremes: relaxing and inciting. 

It was the combative sensations assaulting his nervous system that pushed him the last few cranks towards release. Another curl of Cas’ sinful fingers and he was rising to the edge, shouting over the gag, whimpering… so… fucking…  _ close _ . 

He tensed for it. Right fucking there... 

_ Fuuucck... _

In a flash of movement, Cas halted everything. Every hot stroke of pleasure ripped from his senses. Dean lost control, needing to explode the energy trapped inside him. He immediately wanted to fight, some hypnotic blur forming between two strangely alike physical activities. How were fighting and fucking all that different anyway?

As he tried to twist and swing an arm, Cas manhandled him easy, tossing him back onto the bed. Towering over him. Both of them heaving for air, grunting with the sudden exertion. 

“Dean, look at me.”

Shaking almost violently, he forced himself to find Cas’ blue eyes. They were wide and fixated, staring at Dean with undeniable command. 

“Off,” Dean muttered, biting down on the gag for clarity. 

Cas was quick to wrench it off and the moment Dean’s voice was unencumbered, he was rambling, “Cas, please… I can’t… I can’t stay like this. I’ll break.” It was insane. No man broke from being denied an orgasm. But Christ if that wasn’t exactly how he felt. 

“You’re okay,” Cas promised, smoothing a hand over his face, pushing the damp hair off his forehead. “Spread your legs for me.”

Sighing in relief, he shoved his legs out and groaned without shame as Cas settled into the groove. 

“I can come like this,” he panted, rolling his hips up. His cock brushing against the hard feverish length of Cas’ sex. “Please… fuck, can I come? Please, I… just like this.”

Cas pinned his arms over his head and met his eyes, crystal blue no more than a couple inches away. “I’m sure you can. But you won’t. Feel free to grind into me as much as you want but know that I am asking you not to come. If you want to edge yourself another time… I won’t stop you. But I also won’t use any means to keep you from ejaculating. If you do… you are explicitly going against what I’ve asked of you. Dean, I trust you...”

As he listened to his options, selfish instincts flared at the opportunity to burst like a fucking damn and come so hard he wasn’t sure it would be possible to regret it. But Cas was trusting him. 

Shit, it wasn’t like Cas was trusting him not to fuck up and hightail it out of there. Some promises were too easily broken. All Cas was asking of him was that he not succumb to the archaic demands of his arousal.

“Okay…” he whispered.

Staring into Cas’ watchful gaze, Dean started to roll his hips, tentative at first. Abortive thrusts. Then gradually more steady, finding his rhythm. Every drag of their cocks together was like lightning. A surge of electricity thrumming up the shaft of his dick. It felt _beyond_ good. Even better was the way Cas stared back at him, the shadows thick as their foreheads thumped together

It hit Dean all at once, the sudden desire to make Cas come. To withstand every itch of discomfort for as long as he had to in order for Cas to find release. 

“I want you to finish on me,” he said, licking his lips as he waited for Cas’ reaction.  

Castiel did not disappoint. With a soft desperate growl, he pegged Dean with a look. “Are you sure you can hold back yourself?”

Fucking hell, for Cas... he’d try. “Mm-hmm,” he answered, his upward thrusts getting shaky with the high degree of adrenaline flooding his veins. 

“Feeling you work yourself against me is exquisite… I assure you,” Cas panted, “I won’t take… long.”

Dean breathed in every one Cas’ broken exhales and rode his cock into the heat of Cas’ pelvis, the hard ridge of the angel’s erection. Feeling their shafts grind together, skin sticking. It was maddening. Perfect. 

Arousal peaked over and over and each time he had to stop. Take a breath. Recover for a beat before getting back into it. 

Just when Dean thought he couldn’t take a second more, his abs trembling and tense, his cock aching for release… Cas’ eyes split wide, his mouth punching open and a soft gasp tickled Dean’s lips. 

Hot come splashed between them in rapid spurts, wet lines streaking Dean’s skin, slicking up his swollen cock. Each thrust after desperate and slippery.  

“Ohh fuck,” Dean hissed through his teeth, shuddering against the sweet temptation of letting go. “Ahhh fuck, fuckin’ christ!” 

Holding back the power of an impending orgasm was like stopping a mack truck with his bare hands. Somehow, miraculously, he managed. But he was heaving oxygen like it was going out of style. Every muscle quivered without any sign of abating. 

Dean blew out each exhale as if he were in pain, letting the air slip between barely parted lips. His balls ached like a fresh bruise, feeling hard and wedged between his legs like they no longer fit.  

Each lingering jerk of Cas’ waning erection was another test of his will. 

When they finally settled and he knew the worst was over, he broke. “ _ Cas… _ ” Tears sprung to his eyes, burning hot, spilling over. 

One wracking sob tore through his chest, then another. He had no idea why he was crying. Cas quickly yanked the blankets around them and roped his arms and legs around Dean in a tight sweltering embrace. 

“Don’t hold back.” Cas brushed the wet streaks off his skin, knowing more would come. “I’m right here.”

Finding it impossible to meet Cas’ eyes and maintain any shred of decency, he buried his face into the crook of Cas’ neck. Where the scent of the angel flooded his senses, the warmth of his skin like coming home. 

Dean cried harder than he remembered in recent history. Had no concept of why he was even falling apart. But with each passing second, he felt lighter and freer. As if every phantom marionette string tied to his life had been clipped. Duty, responsibility, and guilt. All of them, gone. 

When the storm of his emotions withered and fell silent, he licked his lips and swallowed the lingering lump in his throat. “I’m sorry,” he said, peeling away from Cas’ throat to meet the angel’s eyes. 

“Don’t be sorry…” Cas said, giving him a soft smile. “But perhaps next time tip me off so I have a chance to tie you up like we discussed.”

He laughed. But the abrupt wave of joy threatened to bring on another bout of sobs so he flattened his lips. Emotions all getting mixed up and mangled. 

“I’ve never felt like this,” he breathed, linking his and Cas’ fingers together above his head. 

“Like how?”

Dean managed to to smile, knowing the expression was weighted. “Like… somewhere in here is the man I was supposed to be… could’ve been. Free to feel whatever the fuck it is I want to feel, you know.”

With a soft kiss to Dean’s cheek, lips grazing as he spoke, Cas replied, “I can give you that freedom, Dean. No fear… no regrets.”

It was scary how easy it was to relent. A simple nod…  _ Yes. Fuck. I want that.  _

“I want you,” Dean declared, voice rough with passion. “I want every moment with you. Fuck the fear… and fuck the uncertainty. Being with you is the only thing that makes me feel like me.” He pushed his chin out, breathing hard. “Fuckin’ hell Cas… I don’t want to miss this. I don’t think I could handle forever alone knowing I’d fucked up a chance for us to have something. It’s insane, I think…” he admitted. “Really. The world is constantly falling the fuck down around us… but in this moment, right now… we’re together. One more moment that can’t be stolen. That matters.” He huffed, compelled by a potential truth. “Maybe the only thing that matters anymore.”

Cas stared into his eyes, searching for a hint of doubt. Dean knew he’d find none. 

“I love you.”

Something very much like hope flared in Dean’s chest. He felt the words on his tongue, had feared them his entire life. But with Cas’ arms around him, his crystal blue eyes patient and full of love, Dean was no longer afraid of speaking the truth. He was afraid of it getting lost in chaos, forgotten in favour of things he thought were more important.  

But nothing was more important. When Dean replied, it wasn’t smooth. His voice was hoarse and his throat was dry, but every word was spoken with undeniable conviction, “I love you too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah so no plot for this chapter. but yay porn? lol


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OOoohhhh look at me posting on Tuesday. ;) I thought I would post now because tomorrow is going to be vey busy. Tons of meetings at work and I'll probably wanna crash as soon as I get home. Less plot this round but still some quality Dean/Cas. Also, if you're a tad squeamish about medical stuff be prepared (it's honestly not that bad though).

However long he’d slept, one hour or forty, was nowhere near long enough. 

When Dean stuttered his way into consciousness, feeling fuzzy and thick, he found himself in Cas’ room with the angel propped up on an elbow. Staring. In the way only Cas can. Not exactly creepy but intense and consuming. As if, for a moment, Dean made up the other man’s entire universe. 

A concept Dean found to be a little unnerving. How does one single human man became the entire focus of a millennial's old angel? Didn’t make sense. 

But, then again, not much else did these days. Devil baby drama, missing demons, angry demons, disappointed family, disappointing family. Also… you know… the fresh red marks on his ass and his new  _ profound  _ and  _ kinky  _ relationship with Mr. Stares A Lot. 

“How long you been staring at me?” he asked. 

Cas blushed, but didn’t care to hide it. “An hour or so I suppose. I’m not exactly counting minutes.”

“Have I been out long?”

“Almost ten hours.”

Fuck. Dean’s eyes shot wide. “Ten hours? You mean since after we left the other room? Ten fucking hours?”

Cas smiled. “It appears you needed the rest.”

Sure, he didn’t doubt that but there were more pressing concerns on their hands. “What about Meg? Have you heard from her?”

After a heavy sigh, Cas looked away as he spoke. “Yes. She returned a short while ago at the behest of Rye and the others but when I approached her a few hours ago, she very eloquently told me to fuck off and die.”

Dean’s expression jerked into immediate disapproval. “That's rude. You didn’t do a damn thing wrong where she’s concerned.”

“That hardly matters, Dean. Either way, if she chooses to place blame on me, direct her anger at me… I’m fine with that. If it helps her in some way, there’s no harm.”

When had Dean’s type manifested into someone who was so pure and good. He used to go for bad guys or wild women. Cas might be wild in bed but his moral compass was so fixed it was hard to believe he even existed. “You’re too goddamn nice, you know that.”

“I’m surprised to hear you say that.” Cas narrowed his eyes at Dean, curious.

“Why’s that?” wondered Dean. 

The faintest of smiles danced across Cas’ lips, a gleam in his eyes. “Because I tied you up and spanked last night.”

Hearing the words out loud gave Dean a strange mix of excitement and mortification. It might be in his head but he was sure he could feel his asscheeks burning. “Yeah well… I don’t exactly consider that to be the opposite of nice. If anything… it was, uh, kind of awesome.”

A broad smile broke out across Castiel’s face. “Awesome, hmm?”

Dean grinned. “Don’t get cocky there bud. This relationship… me… none of it’s exactly stable right now. We’ll save the cocky attitude if we hit some kickass milestone or something.”

“What kickass milestone exactly?” Cas asked, leaning closer and tracing his lips along the edge of Dean’s jaw. 

Distracted, Dean swallowed and turned his head. Giving Cas full access and control becoming an instinct. “Uhh,” he murmured, focusing on the subtle nibble of Cas’ teeth. “How about, uh, one year.” Dean immediately backtracked, “No wait. Six months. Yeah, we’ll wait six months and if the world hasn’t ended, neither of us dead, and we’re still… ya know… doin’ our thing then we can be cocky. Maybe make a weekend of it or something.”

Cas chuckled. Then licked a stripe down the length of Dean’s throat. “A cocky weekend?”

Yeah, Dean set himself up for that one. “Hmm, yeah. Very cock-y.”

As Cas’ lips found Dean’s and they distracted each other in a slow languid morning kiss, Dean wondered how it was possible to feel so much more balanced and in control. Given how distraught he felt the night before, the sheer power of Cas’ influence in taking him apart… Dean had to consider the more he accepted his emotions for Cas—no matter how raw and intense they were—the more used to them he got. 

Holy shit. Was he actually desensitizing himself to the angel? Finally? After all these goddamn years. Some kinda miracle right there.  

Knowing chaos awaited them, Dean reluctantly ended the kiss. Pulling back only marginally he gave Cas a small tender smile, their eyes locking onto each other for an immeasurable moment. A silent transfer of affection, full of reverence and content. 

“Guess we better go meet up with everyone. See where things are at.”

Cas dipped his chin. “I suppose we should.”

It took Dean several tries to actually vacate the bed. The first time he moved his legs over, Cas reached out and hooked his thigh to drag him back. They kissed for a few seconds until Dean groaned and tried to escape once more. This time he was the one to reach back, cradling Cas’ face in his hands, drawing the angel to him for one more graze of his lips. The slick feel of his tongue, the taste of it. Like sweet water and something enticingly deep and earthy. 

As he drew back, he released a little hum. Dean opened his eyes to see Cas gazing back at him, eyes a bit glassy, a faint smile pulling at his broad features. All of it making Dean feel a little dizzy. 

“You’re fucking sexy as all hell. You know that right?” Dean said.

Cas grinned wider, amused. “Why thank you. As are you.” With a huff, Dean turned to stand, walking across to the closet only the be interrupted by Cas’ add-on, “Especially sexy when you’re bent over my lap letting me unravel you so carefully.”

For a half-second, Dean choked on air. Imagined the pictures of himself he’d left permanently in Cas’ mind. He shivered and did not let his mind drift off to imagining future encounters. There were other more pressing matters at hand. It would be wise not to go off thinking of, nay  _ daydreaming _ , of Cas’ particular hand smacking against his very fleshy behind. 

Dressed a few minutes later, they emerged from the room. Dean felt like a spotlight was on them. Sure as fuck whoever they encountered would see the red colour of ass or smell the lingering scent of sexual frustration that had boiled in him the night before. 

Even now, his balls still hurt. Enough that walking around made him hyper-aware of their presence. It felt like they were double the size. Sensitive as all hell. Every brush of fabric making his teeth grind. 

They progressed down the rest of the hall and took a left, navigating their way easily to Zet’s office. When they made it halfway there, the noise hit them. 

At first a murmur of clipped voices, rising louder the closer they got. 

“.... _ can’t seriously expect me to stay quiet about this!” _

Dean catalogued the man’s voice as Dexter, who he hadn’t spoke much to but his gritty voice was hard to miss. It was the sort of voice Dean might’ve once referred to as a can full of sex and gravel. But of all the men who fell into that category, no one rocked a deep voice like Cas did. 

“ _ I am not about to throw our home into a panic. We’ll figure it out!,”  _ snapped Zeta. His accent thicker than usual.

Outside the door, he and Cas lingered. It was an unspoken agreement they decided to eavesdrop. No doubt it wouldn’t take long for the other men to catch their scent or hear them. The demons were formidable. 

“ _ Figure it out?! With all due respect, brother… people are going missing.” _

What the hell? Dean threw a questioning look over his shoulder. He mouthed at Cas, “ _ People?” _

With a shrug, Cas took Dean by the elbow and all but shoved him into the doorway. Out in the open, Dean stared into the space to find the two demons huffing and puffing at each other. Hackles raised, eyes hard as ice. 

“What’s going on boys?”

Zeta met Dean’s steady gaze. “Is your head on straight?”

Feeling so much more like himself, Dean had to laugh. “Head’s never been exactly straight, but yeah I’m good. Sorry about what happened before… I, uh…”

Saving Dean from trying to explain, Cas jumped in, “It’s not important.” Giving both demons his trademark  _ I-could-squash-you  _ look, he said, “Who else is missing?”

Dexter and Zeta shared a long silent exchange. When the leader finally huffed his defeat, a sharp wave of his hand before he turned his back, Dexter geared up. “Matt is gone…”

“Shit.” Dean rubbed at his face. “When’d that happen?”

It was just a flick of his tongue. A nervous gesture. The kind of thing Dean saw all the time running scams and hustling for a few bucks. “Early morning. Some time between six and seven.”

Trying to fight the nagging itch, Dean questioned more. “Doing rounds? I thought no one was gonna be doing any of that shit alone. Or at all?”

When the response came, it wasn’t from Dexter but Cas. Sounding unnervingly grim. “He wasn’t alone … was he?”

Dexter gravely shook his head, his only flicking over to Dean before darting away. 

Panic lit off inside Dean’s chest. “Where’s my brother?”

Silence struck the room, as if no one dared to breathe. It was almost hilarious. Like they were afraid of Dean when he was the least powerful being in the room. 

Of course his rage was something else. “Where the fuck is my brother?”

Zeta finally stepped back into the conversation, his eyes level with Dean’s. “He was with Matt… they’re both gone.”

“Okay, so what the hell are we waiting for!? We know it was Michael.” Dean shot Cas a look of immediacy. “Let’s summon the bastard… come on.”

Cas pressed his lips together, conflicted. “We can’t. There aren’t enough resources to summon an archangel and we don’t know for certain he was the one who took them.”

“I feel pretty fucking certain,” Dean argued. 

“I am inclined to agree with you,” said Dexter. “But I can’t risk anyone else. The only way to get them back is to continue with our plans.”

Oh hell no. “Our plans involved everyone staying alive. Ya’ll know exactly what’s going on here. Grayson, and Matt, my brother—they’re all bargaining chips. Either we hand Kelly and the baby over or we lose parts of our family. I don’t know about you but that ain’t fucking happening on my watch.”

A charged silence crept between them. No one really confident of one single plan of action. They were saved the choice when Rye came racing into the room, his hands bloody, dual-toned eyes wide with panic. “Something’s wrong,” he shot out, meeting his leader’s eyes. 

In a quick second it was clear to everyone the something wrong had to do with the baby. And by default, Kelly. Which would explain why Zeta was suddenly looking as if he’d been sacked in the gut by an anvil. 

“Is she?”

Rye shook his head. “No, but there’s a lot of blood.”

As they all raced off behind Rye, being led to an unknown emergency that could very well result in a death or two. Or, if they were lucky—he supposed—the birth of Lucifer’s child. Zeta was running faster than all of them, doubling his stride without breaking a sweat. 

Dean’s mind replayed the man’s horror. All around him people seemed to be losing the one’s they cared about. Sam was out in the unknown. Grayson and Matt gone too. Now they might lose Kelly… along with their one hope of getting his brother and the others back. 

They finally stumbled to a halt by Kelly’s room and Alis was already there at the woman’s side. Meg too. Rye went back to his post between the woman’s spread knees, a white cloth covering all the things Dean would really rather not see. 

Alis began speaking in clips of information. “It started twenty minutes ago. Bleeding, only a little. Then more and cramping. And we think the baby’s coming now… but there’s too much blood.”

Kelly screamed, her words garbled, “Get him out, please God, get him out.”

“God ain’t gonna help no one,” Dean muttered, sharing a look with Cas. 

Rye barked at Alis and Cas, “Your fucking angels—Do something!”

“I already told you, I can’t!” Alis fired back. 

Cas, ever the one to help, stepped forward and tried to lay a hand on Kelly’s covered knee. There was a sizzle and he ripped his hand away with a hiss. “It won’t let me…”

In a breath, Kelly suddenly went lax, her eyes falling shut. There was a gaping fat screaming second of time where no one moved a goddamn muscle and then it was as if everyone hit the track running at the same time. Dean, having very limited knowledge about medical stuff left it all in Rye’s hands, who seemed to know what he was doing. 

“I need to get it out,” the demon said this looking to Zet for permission. “It’s gonna kill her. We need to move.”

Their leader looked about to collapse. This, Dean could help with. He walked over and laid his hand on the man’s shoulder. “Rye’s got this. You need to let him do his thing.”

Finally, Zet nodded. He stumbled back out of the door and fell to the ground against the rear wall of the hallway. Cas reached out and took Dean’s hand, coming to stand next to him. The angel’s breath a whisper against his ear, “We’ll make it through this.”

Dean saw Rye slicing Kelly open from the corner of his eye, but he averted his gaze and focused on the blue in Cas’ eyes. He couldn’t watch. This wasn’t the kind of fighting he did. He was useless. 

It was bad enough just to hear Zet’s low hiccupped cries in the hallway. Worse to hear Rye barking orders at Meg for tools and gauze and all sorts of medical crap. Dean could smell the blood, the thick scent that only comes from the inside. A basic coppery note saturating the air. 

Feeling dizzy, Dean pulled Cas closer and dropped his forehead to the angel’s shoulder. “Never get pregnant, k.”

The angel laughed, rubbing his palm against Dean’s back. “I’ll do my best.”

When an infant’s wail screeched through the room, everyone released a collective sigh. All except Zet, who raised his face from the well of his palms, tear-streaked cheeks and puffy lids. He wouldn’t feel relieved unless they told him Kelly was still alive. 

Dean hardened his nerves and turned around. 

She lay there, sliced open and motionless. The baby lay nestled in Meg’s arms while Rye tried to save Kelly. His fingers worked lightning fast as he sewed her up, alternating between stitching and checking her vitals. 

In a quiet voice, he said, “Dean… you can do CPR?”

He swallowed. “Yeah.” Moving in two quick strides, he did a reflexive check and felt his heart go cold when he felt no breath against the back of his hand. He immediately started to work her lungs and heart in a familiar pattern. 

Rye continued to stitch her up. But for all of his Dean’s efforts, five minutes going now, nothing was changing. He’d relent and she wouldn’t breathe on her own. 

There was a long silence when he paused too long. Not knowing if he should continue. But the moment he heard a heartbroken wail from the hallway he knew he couldn't stop. As shaky as his arms were, his breath too as it was released into her lungs, he couldn’t stop. Because all he could imagine was being in Zet’s position as Cas lay somewhere dying. If someone stopped trying to save him, Dean would hate them forever. 

Wait a minute… “Cas!” Dean cried, turning far around to his left to see the angel and then back to his right to see the other, “Guys,” he spoke, excited, “the baby’s out… you can save her now! You can touch her!”

It was a train of thought no one had stumbled onto. All at once the two angels descended on her, both of them lighting up at the palm. Dean felt the heat and stepped back out of the way, closing his eyes to the light. 

Nothing was silent the way death often can be. There was the baby screaming still, Rye’s warbled hush sounds, Zet’s stark silence from the hall like a silent wail, and the keening sound of angel’s working in a way no standard physics or medicine would ever be able to understand. 

But the best sound. Best of everything was the ragged shout that suddenly ripped through the room. Every flicker of white light died off and the picture cleared. 

In front of them, Kelly was finished yelling and was panting as if she’d run a half marathon. Her eyes were wide, the brown like whiskeyed caramel. Castiel and Alis showed matching expressions of potent relief. 

“Is he okay?!” Kelly asked, frantic. She whipped her head to the left, seeing Rye and the child. “Is he okay?”

Rye smiled, thought it was shaky. “Kid’s tough. Just like his mama.”

She beamed and reached out. The demon didn’t waste a moment in giving the woman what she wanted. As she took the child, drawing him in towards her chest, Zeta stepped into the room. He looked wrecked, but the red-rimmed eyes were overshadowed by the love in them. 

“I don’t know what I would’ve… I didn’t expect to–”

“It’s okay,” she said softly, smiling. “Come here.”

Having them all in the room suddenly felt cramped and a bit suffocating. Now that the intense drama was dwindling, the non-essentials left the room, leaving Kelly, Zeta, and the most wanted infant on the planet alone. 

Out in the hallway, Alis and Castiel began a muffled conversation. Dean wasn’t focused on Cas just then but Meg, her slim body back to being hers and Rye with his arms around her, his voice low, “We’ll find him, M. I promise.”

Dean walked over, not sure if she’d welcome him. Dexter stood beside the two, his expression quizzical. No doubt wondering if Dean would tell her and the others what he knew. What he and Cas had overheard before they came here. 

The answer was hell yes. “Sammy and Matt are gone now too.”

Rye and Meg both cut their eyes over to Dean, shock rising. “Gone? Both of them?”

Dean nodded. “We need to draw the enemy in. Now that the baby is born, Kelly’s okay… we got not choice. We gotta do this now.”

Behind him, Cas and Alis strode up into the conversation. “We’re a few bodies short,” Cas noted. 

Meg curled her lip. “Then we get more. Dean, with Sam gone… you know you can get your mother in on this and I bet she’ll drag along that British prick.”

Dexter addressed Meg, “The Men of Letters will nerve side with us.”

“No,” Dean agreed. “But they don’t want the monsters getting their hands on the kid either. I’ll think they’ll side with us if they have to. Better chance to win. Sure they’ll come at us after, but if our plans goes off the way we want, won’t matter if they do.”

Everyone considered it, knowing there wasn’t much time for another plan. Sam and the others weren’t gonna last long with a psychopathic archangel. 

Zeta came out into the hall, his arms cradling the infant. “Dean’s right. We do this now.” He met eyes with Dexter and Rye. “Find your brothers. Set it in motion now.”

They two demons nodded and drifted off together down the hall. Meg snarled and turned around sharply to follow them. “I’m a fighter too, Z!”

He gave her retreating form an indulgent smile. “That she is.”

Everyone crept off to get ready, Dean and Cas quietly moving to the weapons room as instructed by the leader of the demons. When they got to it, Dean abandoned all thoughts of strapping his body with weapons and instead shoved Cas into a rack of M8’s and started kissing the goddamn life out of him.

In muttered breaths between kisses, Cas tried to shush Dean’s sudden fanaticism. “Everything will…” Dean stole a taste of his mouth, briefly shutting him up “...be fine,” Cas finished. 

No way was Dean about to process through the statistical probability of their impending death. Or fall into a tailspin about having no fucking clue where his brother was. All he focused on was the craving inside him, a low burn in the pit of his stomach. A pinch at the centre of his chest. This absolute desperation to get Cas’ skin under his hands. 

It was the second he tried to undo Cas’ pants when the angel stopped him. “Dean.” 

The sharp slap of his name brought him to a halt. When he chanced to look at Cas’ face, the man was clenching his jaw. “W-what?” Dean stuttered.

As a response, Cas grabbed Dean’s hands and locked his wrists together, shoving his arms above his head in a lithe move as he flung Dean across the small aisle between shelves. Dean’s back slammed against the lines of metal. His breath rocketed out of his lungs. 

“I won’t have you becoming reckless.” Cas’ voice was thick like syrup but hard as nails. “Bad things happen every single day. You fight through it… you always have. Being with me will not change this. I will not have your crippling fear become the thing that gets you killed.”

Finding himself under the heat of Cas’ stormy gaze was just as much of a mind-fuck as it was the very first time. He swallowed his unease, trying to ignore the stubborn weight in his groin.    
“S’that mean you’re not gonna fool around with me? Ya know… just in case?” He tried to grin about it, tried to lighten his frantic desperation to a less obvious setting. 

Cas wasn't easily fooled. But he wasn’t as strong-willed as he pretended to be. There was a slight twitch of his brow, the lift of his upper lip. A second later Dean found himself shoved up off the floor, his arms still pinned above his head. Scrambling for purchase, he threw his legs around Cas’ hips and groaned into the rough kiss unfolding between them. 

All Dean wanted was to feel Cas inside him, but he knew there was no way Cas would give in to  _ that  _ in such a wild and untamed moment. Much less when they were in a weapons room with Dean’s back against boxes of ammo. 

It was all hot and heavy for all of five minutes. A lot of awkward grinding and demanding kisses. Until Cas pulled a stop and rested his face into the crook of Dean’s neck, breathing hot against his skin. 

“Time to kick some ass I guess,” Dean muttered. 

Cas laughed, a thready tired sound. “Yes.” He raised his eyes to Dean. “Kiss me once more and I’ll put you down.”

With a smug grin, Dean angled forward and nipped Cas’ lips, drawing the angel into a kiss. He let his tongue sweep inside, teasing Cas’ response. It was brief, but he knew it would carry them both through whatever awaited them. 

As they checked and loaded gun after gun, Cas turned to him with an air of confidence. “We’ll get your brother back, and the others. I am certain of it. We have each other, now… And I don’t plan to let anything, um… fuck with that, as you would say.”

Dean smiled. The f-bomb on Cas was a good look. “Sounds good to me,” he said, snapping in a banana clip full of monster killing rounds.  

Time to fuck some shit up. 


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, sooooo massive apologies are due because I am obviously waaaaay behind in posting. And I am so so so very sorry for this. Seriously, I had not intended to have such a break in this fic. 
> 
> Anyway, I swear this fic is moving along towards an end (about four more chapters), but the last few weeks I had some, uhhh, extenuating circumstances that was a large part of the reason I wasn't able to write more for this on the regular schedule I've been doing. Things are much better now and I am back on track and I swear I'll have more details about my writing absence soon but that's a bit on the down low right now. I know, all very mysterious and I'm sorry. 
> 
> Posting this chapter now, and hoping to have the next one up soon. 
> 
> If there are errors in this, please let me know as it has not been beta'd. Love you guys so much xoxoxo

Reaching out to his mom was not something Dean had been looking forward to. Thankfully, as soon as he cut in over her frantic shotgun-style questions, telling her Sammy had been taken, she assured him she was on her way,  _ and _ bringing reinforcements. 

Dean wanted to be relieved about having a few other bodies to throw around some punches, but ever since the British Dick Bags showed up, he’d just come to hate them more and more. 

As for his mom? Well, Dean hoped her word was good. So far he hadn’t seen the best sides of her. Granted, she hadn’t seen the best sides of him either. 

Hours passed with everyone waiting for the ball to drop. The word had been put out there and the supernatural community knew the child had been born. All sorts of evil and righteous would be storming the proverbial gates any minute. 

But the hours slithered by, like a snake getting closer. As dusk hit, Dean felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. It was closing in on ten when Rye came storming into the room where everyone was “hanging out”. The new super rad term that meant sitting on the edge of your seat, ready to die or deal out death if required. Fun times. 

“She’s here.”

Dean looked up. “She being my mom… or like some unknown deity of heaven or hell?”

The demon twisted his lip. It was obvious Dean’s actions a couple days back still bothered the guy. “Yes, your mother,” he answered with an edge. “And she’s got company.” Rye averted his eyes from Dean to look to his leader. “Are you sure we need them?”

Zeta did nothing more than raise his eyebrows, the truth plain in the silence. 

“Fine. But I wouldn’t put it past them to kill us and take the kid. Try their luck against the horde on their own.”

“It’s chance we’re going to have to take,” Castiel noted. 

Dean decided he’d be the one to ride up in the elevator with Rye and Cas as backup. He suddenly felt the urge to snort a laugh at the hilarity of greeting his mom with a kinky boyfriend on one side, and an almost hookup on the other.

When the doors opened, Dean immediately checked his gun. Rye and Cas did the same, but it was clear both of them didn’t care much for weapons. They both had an energy about them. Destructive and ready to wield power at a moment’s notice. 

Rye opened the front door to the false-front of the house. Nothing more than a reception area really. 

There was a static-filled silence for a beat and then just as Rye started to snarl at one of the Men of Letters, Dean jerked him back by the elbow and set his eyes on his mother. 

“Mom.”

“Dean,” she said with a sigh, crossing past the threshold and wrapping her arms around him. He stood still and let her but didn’t feel like returning the gesture. 

After she pulled back and everyone filed inside, Dean raked his eyes angrily over the collective group of British dickbags. There were thirteen of them. More than he’d guessed, but also pretty damn ominous. Ketch and Mick and a few others he didn’t recognize. 

They didn’t all fit in the elevator, despite it’s size. Dean and Cas went with Mary and a few of them, with Rye and the rest following after. 

Standing in the glaringly uncomfortable silence, Dean grated his teeth. Angel ears must have heard him, because as they were nearing the end of their descent, Cas’ fingers slid into his, grounding him. 

If Mary noticed the touch, she said nothing. 

When they were all piled into the main rec room, introductions were tersely given and no one on either side seemed to care who was who. 

Ketch demanded to see the infant but Zet looked about ready to tear his head off so the forceful request sputtered and died as he looked around at the group of powerful beings. Two of which being angels and knew they wouldn’t escape a fight unscathed. 

“We are pooling our resources for one purpose only. To fight what’s coming and to get back those we’ve lost. That is all. We are not friends. But in this fight, we will have each other’s backs… are we agreed on this?”

The British posse nodded without a word. 

Dean felt his mother’s eyes boring into the back of his head. He realized he and Cas had never parted ways from the elevator and his fingers were still tightly braided with Cas’. He couldn’t find it in him to be bothered by the show of affection in a room steeped with fear and hatred. Maybe that was partly why he couldn’t let go. Cas reminded him of what good they thought for, grounded him with silent reason. 

Eventually, when strategic conversations broke out, Dean turned around. Cas stood by his side, resolute to an uneasy moment but saying nothing. Just being there for Dean. 

“You plannin’ to say something?” he asked. 

Mary looked thoughtful, and cautious. As she should be, he thought snidely. “You and Cas… you’re…” she let the unfinished question hang. 

Dean raised his eyebrows. “That a problem for you?”

In all his life, Dean knew liking men had irritated his father, but he never once worried about what his mother would think. He assumed she’d be on his side. Truth was, he didn’t know her for shit. He know a mother of a four-year-old and jaded hunter too settled on the bottom line to see the shades of grey around her. 

She exhaled in a sigh. “No, of course it isn’t. I want you to be happy, Dean. What ever gave you the impression I didn’t?”

Seriously? If only he had more time to list of the reasons. Shortsightedness, abandonment, carelessness. Lucky for her, now wasn’t the time. “Doesn’t matter. I didn’t ask you here for a one on one.”

His mother opened her mouth to speak, but something caught her eye and she stopped. Dean turned and looked at the others. All the demons had gone still, their heads tilted as if there ears were perked like guard dogs. 

Beside him, Castiel went stiff. His long fingers starting to crush the bones in Dean’s hand. 

“Cas,” he hissed, grinding his teeth against the pain.

The angel immediately let go and reached for his blade. Not exactly a good sign. “Get ready,” he warned in a low voice, glancing at Dean with something dark and foreboding in his gaze. 

Dean reached for his gun, clicked off the safety and listened to the similar sounds around the room. A low growl, thick and animal-like reached his ears and he looked across the space to see Rye. All hard lines and power. 

It started as a vibration. Dean felt it run up from the floor through his legs. A thundering rumble building through the base, growing in force. Echoing in every room as the structure rattled in place. 

Zeta yelled, “Everyone outside! Go!”

No turning back now. Dean followed everyone moving through the halls, some of the demons veered off and took an unknown route to the surface. 

But no one made it to the surface. 

Dean cut around a corner and had to jump back with a shout as some unknown demon or angel, he wasn’t yet sure, swung a knife at his throat. Someone behind him barked out a few commands, but Dean was into shit now and couldn’t redirect his attention even for a second. 

He fired a shot at it. Nothing happened. The intruder gave him a smirk and dove forward, slashing the knife towards his chest. Dean kicked at the last second and flung himself backwards until his back collided with Cas’ chest. Or he assumed Cas, given the way the crash pad behind him didn’t budge on impact and the subtle “ _ mmph _ ” that resonated against Dean’s ear. 

Dean was shoved out of the way, and he watched in shock as Cas strode ahead and palmed the man’s face, light blasting from the touch. A scream tore through the hall. One of the Men of Letters raced by Dean with Mary on his heels. 

But he waited to follow until Cas was done. 

“Guess we’re not heading outside,” he said.

Cas agreed with an obvious flick of his eyes. “Let’s go,” said Cas, jerking his arm out to the side where his blade slid out and into his waiting grip. 

Even in the midst of chaos that move never failed to turn Dean on a little bit. A far better reaction than fear of death or abandonment. Thankfully, the adrenaline was doing it’s job and brushing aside his worry in favour of action. 

As they started jogging after the splintered group, Cas shot him an accusing look, “You’re aroused right now?”

What the? How? “No, I’m not,” he snorted indignantly. Cas deadpanned him with a summarizing eye roll. “Okay fine. But hey, at least I’m not freaking out about everyone dying!”

Cas groaned and redoubled his space, making Dean pant and wheeze to try and keep up with a goddamned angel. They saw Mary up ahead and he got his gun ready. She was in hand-to-hand with an angel. 

The only way he could tell was because of the light in it’s eyes as it healed from some kind of wound. Dean snagged the blade from Cas’ hand and wrenched his arm back before letting the blade sail through the air.

“Mom, down!”

Having the reaction of a hunter, she dropped immediately and they saw the blade find home in the angel’s chest. Light broke out into the hall. The angel crashed to the ground, black ashy outlines splattered along the carpet and walls. 

He glanced to his right and watched Cas swallow, eyes wide with pain and regret. “Hey,” Dean took his arm and forced him around, “them or us right now. You know that.”

Cas bit his lip, nodded. But it was clear to Dean he was still aggrieved by the whole situation. Fuck, who wouldn’t be. 

They progressed through the halls, finding an endless number of targets every few feet. The entire place was swarming with angels and demons like the most fucked up supernatural ant hill. 

“We need to protect Kelly,” he mumbled to Cas, wary of eavesdropping guests around every corner. 

Cas met his eyes and dipped his chin, grabbing Dean by the arm as they started chasing the scent of gunpowder and blood.

Dean tried to remember the plan. There was a plan in place, an illusion the demons were going to swing with the help of Alis to confuse the offending parties and try to convince everyone the infant had died in battle. 

Only the power of these ancient men guided with an angel’s grace could be potent enough to pull the wool over everyone’s eyes. It wasn’t easy to fool hunters. It would be worse trying to fool demons and angels alike. 

As Dean cut around one of the last corner, he arrived just in time to see three black-eyed motherfuckers chasing down towards Kelly’s room. 

“I don’t fuckin’ think so!” he shouted. 

Dean body slammed one of them, holding her against the wall through sheer surprise and shock while he knifed the other. To his right, Cas was already face-palming a death sentence to the third wheeler. As Dean stepped back, Mary strode up and took care of the snarling woman Dean had pinned. 

When all three demons crumpled to the crisp beige carpet, blood leaking all over the damn place, Dean turned to Cas and held his eyes for a second. It was chaos around them. Not in their immediate vicinity, but they heard the vibrations of violence roll through. 

A boom as if a grenade had gone off. Pop-pop-pops of gunfire. An occasional scream or growl that would ripple through the air ducts like a horrifying halloween soundtrack. 

But as he looked into Cas’ sharp blue eyes, he managed to ground himself and put it all out of his mind. No matter what happened, at least he had a few memories of them together. 

“Dean…” Cas said softly, reaching out to take his shoulders. “Everything will be fine.”

He tried to give off a cocky grin, wanting to mutter something like, “Of course it will. I’m awesome.” But the vibe just wasn’t there. Instead he grabbed Cas by the shirt and yanked him close for a kiss. 

It was quick thing; nothing satisfying. But needed. 

Behind him, his mother made a little sound and he turned back to see her smiling. She said nothing. 

The awkward family moment was broken the second they heard a sharp, blood-curtling scream cut through the air. It came from down the hall. Way past Kelly’s room and around the corner. Dean picked up his feet and hightailed it down the carpeted path, leapfrogging dead bodies on his way. 

Throughout his entire whackjob life, he’s walked or run in on some crazy ass shit. But for the life of him, when the three of them turned the corner to face down whatever the hell, he knew they were fucked. 

Like, Godzilla ‘bout to raise the town kind of fucked. Maybe literally...

As if they hit a brick wall, all three stuttered to a stop at the sight. It’s gotta be a hallucination, he thought. Something the demons had cooked up. Had to be. 

The strangest of silences crept through the hall. No one willing to tip the scales from inaction to action. Especially when action could mean getting shredded apart like meat through a grinder. 

His mother’s voice was the first to trip past the shock. “Is-is that…”

Dean swallowed. “Uh-huh.”

Only the angel wasn’t as phased. “Hmm, that’s unnerving. I was certain the ancient dragons had gone extinct.” 

“Obviously not!” Dean hissed back.

Both himself and his mom fired a look at Cas, their wide eyes imploring guidance. 

All the angel did was stare back and utter one single word: “ _ Run _ .”   
  



	24. Chapter 24

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See look, it's Wednesday and I'm posting. This fic is slowly coming to a close but there's more porn to come, I just needed to wrap up the plot portion of the devil's baby drama. 
> 
> For any of you BDB fans, you'll notice another similarity in this chapter. I couldn't help myself. Sorry for any spelling errors and whatnot, haven't had a chance to get it beta'd.

Already out of breath, Dean couldn’t help glaring at Cas at intervals as they cut through hallways trying to escape a nine foot tall Godzilla. 

“You couldn’t have fucking told me there were goddamn dragons, Cas! Like honest to fuck dragons. Scales and all!?”

Cas sighed, rolling his eyes as his coat flapped behind him. “It had never been relevant before! Besides, I was led to believe they were extinct.”

“No time to argue, boys,” Mary quipped. “We’re being chased, remember.”

“Yeah, I’m aware!” snapped Dean. 

As they ran, and Dean was quickly losing energy, Cas came to an abrupt stop. His eyes narrowed for a second, his head tilted as if he were listening to something regular old humans weren’t permitted to hear. 

Dean watched as those blue eyes shot open again, meeting his eyes with purpose. “Follow me.”

Beelining to the right, Cas whipped through the halls in a different direction moving faster than Dean could handle but not too fast to lose them behind.

They managed to find a way back to one of the rec rooms. As they burst through the doors, the scene unfolding was biblical. 

Dean lost all the air in his lungs. 

Kneeled on the ground in a gruesome death-ready lineup was his brother, wounded bad by the looks of it, along with the other missing demons. All of them under the shadow of angels, blades held against their throats. 

Some of the men of letters, Zet, and Rye stood off to the side, fury and grief rolling off them in waves. Alis was there, her blade out and bloody. 

But more concerning than all was the macabre scene in the centre. Michael stood over a spill of blood, his arms outstretched, a manic grin splitting his face. Kelly was unconscious or dead in Zet’s arms, both of them crumpled on the stained carpet. 

A small baby blanket covered what Dean could only imagine was the newly delivered infant. Unmoving and silent. He had no idea if their ruse had been a success or it all had become an epic, horrific fail. 

Dean watched as Cas stormed ahead of him, blade thrust forward. Murder written across the angry lines of his face. 

At the last second, Dean yelled for him to stop but he didn’t falter. No, no, no… Fear raced like ice through his veins and Dean tried to scramble forward in the hopes of yanking Cas back from the fray. 

It was no use. His forward motion spurred on the others. All the static emotion in the room exploded like an atomic bomb and for a full minute, noise and violence erupted in a whirl of chaos. 

When light exploded behind him, his heart plummeted to his gut. Nausea rolled inside him. As he started to turn around, he caught the look on Rye’s face and he just knew. 

Seeing Cas motionless on the blood-stained floor broke Dean completely. Not caring about anything else going on around him, not the way Kelly had stopped crying and seemed to be asking Zet something. Not the way he could hear Sam crying softly in the background. 

None of it. 

Dean fell to his knees and doubled over Cas’ lifeless form. He grabbed at the man’s clothes and pulled him closer, he buried his face into Cas’ chest, tasting the scent of spilled blood on the back of his tongue. 

Grief sliced through him like a rusty blade, hacking away at the already-tattered remnants of his soul. Years of abuse had left him too raw, too broken to handle another loved one’s death. And this one?

Fuck. No. He just wasn’t capable of doing it. For Cas, he wanted to try. He did, but he just… couldn’t. Physically, his heart was beating but whatever life he’d had seemed distant now, a thing he could no longer hold onto. 

Guilt threaded in with the pain because he was letting the angel down. He wished he was stronger, that he could rise up and avenge the goddamn love of his life but all of his will seemed to vanish. 

He had no plans to move ever again, wasn’t sure he could anyway. He’d lay there and tune out whatever horrifically tragic ending of the world played out around him. 

Surely, it wouldn’t be long. 

When the ground beneath his blood-soaked knees started to vibrate and rumble, he was relieved. Let the world open up and swallow them whole. Cause there was no way he could make it here on his own. 

He could feel the uncertainty of what was coming in the air around him. Everything had stopped whatever it was they’d been doing. Killing each other, posturing… it all ceased.

Dean felt his mother’s hand on his shoulder. He could smell her and for some odd reason, it comforted a part of his heart he thought was lost. Tears fell down his cheeks, sobs wrenched from his throat, and the world shook. 

It started as a dim glow, a flicker of light that stubbornly drew Dean’s attention away from his curled form over Cas’ cooling body. 

By the time his eyes changed focus, he had to use his arm as a shield against the now-blinding light.  

The shaking turned violent and people were thrown off their feet, furniture jerked against the outer concrete walls, collisions sounded like bottled thunder. When the light reached some visceral apex, the air around them pressed inward, making his entire body feel as if it were being squeezed to death by gravity. Just when he thought he couldn’t take another second, the pressure ruptured like a bomb. Air blasted through the room and he fell back, his head cracking against something hard. 

Everything went black. 

 

When Dean came to, the familiar face above him could not have been real. Cas’ slitted blue eyes, full of concern, were too clear to be anything other than heaven. 

“I was worried you wouldn’t be here,” he said. 

At Dean’s words, the angel frowned. “Be where?”

“In heaven… I thought maybe for angels—”

Before he could finish his sentence, he noticed the way Cas was smiling and reaching out to touch his face. “You’re not in heaven, Dean.”

Dean opened his mouth, not sure what was about to come out when he caught the painfully familiar throat-clearing of his brother. The same gesture the giant tended to use when Dean and Cas happened to be having an uncomfortably tense moment. 

Mentally swimming through the dull pain and fog inside his brain, he angled up on his elbows and looked around. 

There was movement all around his peripheral vision. Sam was there, unharmed and alive. But all Dean set his eyes on was the small child standing before him, looking down at him with a faint note of curiosity. As though Dean were an animal it wanted to understand better. 

“Who the hell are you?”

The child, not seemingly a boy or a girl, smiled. Kindness and patience written in the soft lines of their face. “I’m nephilim.”

Confused, Dean glanced around and saw Kelly staring lovingly at … her child? Fuck. Must be. Not a whole lot of other nephilim around this place. But. “Uh, not to be blunt or anything but what is it with you supernatural babies? Ya’ll just seem go from 13 to 30 in like a few days.”

Dean was graced with another smile. “Once we are born, we can choose our age. Should we wish to change it. The angel thought he had killed me, but an archangel doesn’t have such power. Only God could… should he wish to.”

“You brought Cas back?” he asked, quickly looking over to reassure himself what he saw when he woke up was real. 

“Yes. I’d felt the angel’s presence frequently. He was always very compassionate to my mother. He did not deserve death.”

“Fuckin’ right he didn’t,” Dean said tersely. “So,” he looked around at everyone… noting the general vibe of exhaustion and disbelief soaking the air, “is it done? I mean… this can’t be it? There’s gotta be thousands of angels and demons roaming around here.”

No one spoke.

“Isn’t there?”

The Nephilim, whose name Dean wasn’t sure of yet, met the eyes of those around the room. “They have all, entirely, forgotten about my existence and about all of you. I’ve redirected them to whatever it is they do. They will not be a bother for you any more. It was not my intention to bring harm to anyone.”

“Uh, cool,” said Dean. Not sure what the hell else to say. 

The silence didn’t last long. Not with Sam’s puzzled expression going on. “Do you, ah, mind if I ask why you seem, like, really really mature?” He paused, but rambled ahead, “I mean, Cas said nephilim’s were mostly human with some angel powers.”

“I was a product of an archangel and I came into the world knowing who and what I was. Just as there are different orders of angels, there would be different orders of nephilim. I am unlike anything that has come before me.”

Dean couldn’t imagine what it would be like to be the only one of your kind. No doubt this kid was gonna have a lonely life. But thanks to them, Dean wouldn’t and he’d be forever grateful. 

In the lull of conversation, everyone trying to wrap their heads around the confusion, an abrupt thought came to Dean’s mind. “Ahhh… I know you said you take care of like… everyone… but what about the dragon thing that was roaming the halls? Cause I ain’t sleepin’ tonight if Godzilla’s gonna be tromping the halls looking for fresh meat.”

There was a laugh from his far right. Rye, doubling over. “Ah shit, sorry to scare ya bud. Godzilla is Grayson, man. Course when he’s rocking those scales, guy’s just looking for something to dig his claws into, can’t exactly tell friend from foe. It’s a bit of a hamper on things sometimes. He got cursed by some crazy ass witch way back in the day. Makes him turn into a beast sometimes.” 

“I can fix him,” a young voice interrupted, looking curiously at the demons. 

“That’s up to him,” said Matt. “Meg’s probably got him now.”

“Poor bastard’s probably worried he ate one of us. We should go check on the two of them.”

Most of the demons left the room. In their absence, Kelly strode over to her child, cautious but glowing with unprecedented happiness. “No matter your age or what you are, I’m your mom, okay?”

The two hugged and Dean heard a softly whispered response, “Of course you are. What a silly thing to say.” 

Mother and child together, followed by Zet, headed off to do whatever. The leader of the demons dipped his chin towards Dean and the others, gratitude strong in the purple tone of his eyes. 

Dean walked over to Sam and threw his arms around the guy. “Damn you get kidnapped a lot.”

Sam laughed. “Hazard of the job.”

Yeah, no shit. Mary seemed to be waiting awkwardly for her chance to hug her youngest son. Dean turned and met her eyes. He pulled her into his arms. “Thanks for coming, mom. And, uh… you’re welcome to stay if you want. I think we’re gonna hang out here a few days before going home.”

She eased back and offered up a guarded smile. She knew they were still on thin ice. Relationships aren’t mended or built in a day. Even if that had been one insane day. “Sure. I think I’d like that.”

Alright. She was staying. As he let his mother and younger brother have their little reunion, he met the hard stares of the men of letters hanging around looking as if all their big bad toys had been taken from them. They looked impotent somehow. Dean tried to hide his grin, but he failed.

“Needless to say, you guys ain’t welcome stay. We’ll work with you on cases in the future, but we do it our way. That clear?”

Ketch was the first to twitch, taking another few seconds to speak. “Deal.”

They shook hands, knowing they hated each other and the british turds left without another word. 

Finally. 

Dean wanted nothing more than to grab Cas and kiss the fucking crap out of him. He faced the angel and knew every stress of the day sat heavy on the lines of his face. Chaos and gun fire and a fucking godzilla and Cas dying and nephilim’s…

Too damn much going on. 

Normally he’d drink… but why take the bottle when another beautiful addiction was standing in front of him. 

“Want to get out of here?” asked Castiel.

Dean sighed, reaching forward and practically sagging around Cas’ frame. He tucked his face into the warmth of angel’s neck. “You’ve no fuckin’ idea.”

Cas chuckled and tapped Dean’s temple. “Yes, I do. You’re emotions are very loud right now.”

Once upon a time, it would’ve bugged him to know Cas was all up in his feels but now he just appreciated not having to explain himself. 

They said their goodbyes to Sam and Mary and silently walked back to Cas’ room. It didn’t bother him to walk along without a word between them. It was needed. Everything had been too loud up until then and the silence was a welcome breath of air. 

Despite his body craving some form of rest, he knew what he needed was something else. Somehow, Cas was alive and here. Again. No matter what seemed to happen, the angel always returned to him. Dean had to wonder if the idea of being fated to someone was legitimately possible. Like maybe Chuck wasn’t as absent as he pretended to be. 

Maybe good old God was upstairs with a bucket of popcorn rooting for Dean’s sad sorry ass to find some happily ever after with one nerdy badass motherfucking angel. 

Hey, a guy could hope. The upbeat thought had him shaking his head. Man… now he was dreaming up happily ever after scenarios? Thinking about being fated to Cas somehow like he was a fairytale princess? 

Geez, he had it bad, didn’t he?

Cas chuckled. “Don’t worry,” he assured Dean, “I’m just as crazy about you.”


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Geez, here i was planning for an entire chapter of porn ... and i'm sorry to say but it's actually going to be MORE than one chapter of porn because well... it was getting kind of long haha. 
> 
> Enjoy a little grace-powered orgasms ;) More to come... haha punny pun pun. 
> 
> Also -- see end for more notes.

“Will the crazy never end?” Dean asked sarcastically. He stood beside the bed in Cas’ room, lit by a single lamp, wondering if it was too presumptuous to start ripping his clothes off. Not even ten seconds had passed since they entered the room. 

But, _God_ … he needed touch more than he needed air. Or food. 

Cas shucked his jacket, a gesture that always got Dean a little hot under the skin. “I doubt it. But… we survived, didn’t we?” 

A bitter laugh breezed past his lips. He threw Cas a look. “I’m not sure dying and then being miraculously brought back to life counts as surviving.”

“Perhaps not.” For a moment, Cas was hesitant as he walked over to Dean. His blue eyes watchful and curious. Dean blinked in relief when Cas pressed his palms to Dean’s face, holding his attention. “When you thought I was gone… what did you do?”

Dean ground his teeth. All hope of being a stronger man had been eviscerated. “I waited to die… Fucking hoped for it.”

An immediate frown descended over Cas’ features, the angel’s thumbs brushed tenderly against his skin. “Dean,” he said sadly. 

Nothing else was said. No matter how hard Dean wanted not to be addicted to Cas, not to crave his presence the way he did. It was impossible. Maybe with time he’d get better. Either way, tonight he needed to be with Cas to calm the sour taste left in his soul from the earlier grief. 

Dean held his head up and looked deep into Cas’ eyes. “Be with me,” he whispered. 

A soft reflection of love glazed over Cas’ blue eyes and he dipped his chin without saying a word. His hands guided down over Dean’s throat and settled on the buttons of his shirt, undoing them one at a time. They stared at each other, not once breaking away and slowly, gradually, Dean’s breaths started to come faster and rougher. 

He knew where tonight was going.  

It wasn’t even that he was scared or on the verge of panic. It was something else. A swollen emotion fighting to live within the confines of his weakened body. He loved Cas more than he knew how to process it. Moments like this, he felt as if he were drowning in it. 

Of course... the hovering sense of anticipation did just as much to steal his breath. 

Dean fell into a trance as Cas carefully removed his clothes, his focus entirely resting on the streaks of blue in Cas’ eyes. It was the one part of the angel Dean knew was wholly and completely him. Even if, in some tragic circumstance, Cas ever had to change vessels… Dean knew those eyes would guide him back to who they were and what they meant to each other.

“Your mind is drifting,” Cas noted, a soft curve to his lips as he traced an imaginary line on Dean’s skin. 

Dean smiled with a sigh, closing his eyes. “Sorry.” He reached out and pushed Cas’ rumpled, blood-spattered trenchcoat off his shoulders. “If it helps… I was still thinking of you.”

The angel grinned and watched Dean take the lead, pulling off his worse-for-wear attire. “It does.”

In slowly revealing Cas’ skin, Dean felt a thick warmth blanket him, arousal pooling deep and low. When Cas’ pants and boxers were finally nudged to the floor, Dean threw his arms around the angel’s neck and drew him in for a needed kiss. 

He inhaled as he parted his lips, tasting Castiel on his tongue. It felt surreal somehow. To feel Cas pressed against him, the heat of his skin sinking into Dean and the flavour of his mouth lighting up his senses. 

Before he knew it, Cas was guiding him back towards the bed; their mouths fused in a desperate, biting kiss. 

All those times he’d thought he’d lost Cas for good, yet here they were. Against all odds. Dean had to cling to that, to remember he should absorb every second they spent together, memorize it, revel in it. 

One day he’d be stronger. Prepare himself to face a horrible reality. 

But not today… And maybe nights like this were what he’d need to keep him whole. Give him the strength to go forward. 

Dean laid back on the bed, Cas following after wearing a soft smile. In that moment, Dean felt like the world’s biggest virgin. The thought nearly had him laughing. He stifled it, but a nervous smile and anxious exhale couldn’t be helped. It was obvious Cas caught the flare of anxiety in him but the angel said nothing. 

Holding Dean’s arms above his head, Cas nuzzled close and kissed his cheek, his forehead, nose, and lips. Making him feel loved to the point of breaking. 

In an easy gesture, Dean let his legs fall open and was instantly relieved to feel Cas settle between his thighs. Chasing Cas’ mouth for another kiss, he pushed his hips up. Every lick of friction on his groin as Cas moved against him, the hard warm ridge of his cock rutting up against Dean’s slowly began to drive him mad with need. 

He broke the kiss, chest heaving erratically. “Cas,” he breathed the name, flexing the muscles in his arms and savouring the iron hold the angel had on him. It kept him grounded in the moment, splayed out on the bed. Maybe he loved it more than he should. 

Cas grinned, sweet and teasing. “That’s my name.”

A low chuckle escaped Dean, followed quickly by a moan as Cas bit the soft flesh of his throat and drove his hips down into the heat of Dean’s groin… Fuck, he wished they were connected more than what they were already, something deeper. Something even more than the sex he knew was just around the corner. 

“You’re a tease, you know that.”

In response, Castiel arched his back and pinched Dean’s nipple with his teeth. A shock of sensation tore through his veins, his cock kicking uselessly against the warmth of Cas’ pelvis. 

“Don’t pretend you don’t like it,” said Cas. 

Dean groaned. “Never said I didn’t. Was just stating a fact is all.”

In some random pattern, Cas continued his ministrations. Kissing and licking and nibbling his way down Dean’s torso. All the while using his grace to keep Dean’s wrists pinned above his head. “We’re stating facts then, are we?”

“Hmm, guess so,” Dean mumbled, hardly paying attention to Cas’ words when his mouth was being so tantalizingly put to use in other ways.

The angel sucked a reddish mark into the tender part of his hip dipping towards his groin. The heat of Cas’ tight kiss sank into him and he rolled his hips up, wanting more. 

Cas paused, speaking low and thick, running his nose over Dean’s skin… breathing him in. “Dean, the one single fact you need to know… the only thing that matters in this moment is that I will always be a part of you. In this world or another. In one way or another. Maybe even in another life. But, I promise you… what we have transcends death. I can’t explain it… I feel it.”

Fuck. Dean felt the burn of emotion cloud his eyes but he refused to let it take him just yet. He wanted to say something, to respond in kind. Find some way to offer the angel the same security he gave. But Dean was too edged out to form any words of significance. Instead, he opened his mind in the elusive manner he’d become used to, letting every thought and feeling he couldn’t put into words pour through their connection. 

Cas stopped his silent appreciation of Dean’s body to look up at him. “Every part of you is mesmerizing…. Inside and out.” 

A hot blush crept up from his chest to settle on his cheeks. His breath stuttered and lost rhythm. 

Holding Dean’s gaze for a moment longer, Cas watched the flood of emotion and sensation soar through Dean… the open prayer creating a new and distinct level of intimacy. 

When he finally broke away, Dean watched Castiel place a few kisses to his hips before gripping Dean’s thighs and shoving his legs further apart. Dean swore under his breath and his dick hopped wantonly into the air, pointedly desperate. 

Cas smiled against his skin before moving closer to give a small lick over the crest of Dean’s cock. The subtle warmth and wetness had Dean bowing off the bed. The second time, Cas trailed his tongue over the slit and down to tease the ridge. Every salacious touch only a _fraction_ of sensation but so narrowed, so teasing it left Dean breathless and baited. 

Another lick, slower. Then a few more… down the length of his shaft. Cas moved his mouth over to the warm crevice of where Dean’s thigh joined his groin; he licked there too, tonguing downward in a curve to lap under the weight of Dean’s balls. 

Dean’s breath rushed out and he greedily sucked the air back in, chest pumping up and down. He started to squirm as Cas sinfully kissed and tasted every single inch between his legs. He whimpered when Cas gently prodded at his rim. Downright _groaned_ when the angel unceremoniously shoved his tongue inside and licked into him. 

He shameless worked his hips against Cas’ face, quietly whining for more of what he was already getting. Cas didn’t linger as long as Dean would’ve liked and before he knew it, the man he loved was biting down his thighs and sucking hickeys into the softest places. 

Fuck. He never would’ve guessed Castiel was the hickey-giving type. 

As the thought crossed his mind, Cas paused to look up; a devious glint in his eyes. Without a word he held Dean’s eyes, dipped his chin and opened his mouth over the rough location of Dean’s femoral artery. 

“Damn…” he huffed, “going vampire on me?”

Cas smirked. “Your taste and smell  _ is _ stronger here.”

Dean bit his lip and watched intently as Cas sucked hard at his skin. When the angel’s eyes began to glow dimly in the low-lit room he wasn’t scared exactly but it was obvious something was different. Not only did Dean feel the pull of Cas’ hard kiss, but he felt something else. Arousal flaring inside him, coalescing lower and deeper into his body. His eyes fluttered and the room lost focus as he fell into a hypnotic daze of pleasure. 

When he found his way back to the moment, Cas was kneeling between his legs, studying him. 

“How do you feel?”

Dean shivered and smiled. Finding he could move his arms, he reached a hand down and fingered along the tender skin still damp from Cas’ lips. 

“I feel…” he searched for the right words, looking up to the ceiling and back down at Cas. “I don’t… I don’t know. I feel everything. Kind of… uh, tingly and heavy and unhinged.”

Cas smiled wide and descended over him, capturing his mouth in a passionate kiss. It stroked Dean’s already primed desperation and he let out a soft sob into the kiss, ready for more, needing it. 

Pulling back barely an inch, Cas hovered over him. Their lips grazing so close, faces in shadow. Cas stared into his eyes and seemed to be reading him. Digging into his every thought and feeling and Dean let him in, wanting him to be there.

When Cas’ hand slipped between his legs, fingers already slick… Dean shuddered, gasping at the touch.

“How long do you think you’ll last when I finally take you?”

Fuck, Dean broke out into a sweat from those words. He wanted nothing more than to be fucking taken. “Ha,” he chuckled nervously. “Try sixty seconds or less.” As it was, his cock had already been leaking precome steadily onto his abs. 

“Guess we should get in some warm up orgasms first then?” Cas grinned, circling Dean’s tight hole with his finger. 

All sounded great in theory, but Dean worried if Cas wore him out too quick, he’d pass out before they got to the good stuff. “Not too long,” he pleaded, unshaded worry leaching into his voice.

Cas gazed at him, blinking once. “I’ll only ever push you as far as I know you can go.”

Unable to speak, he nodded. Dean closed his eyes as Cas rubbed along his crease, lubed fingers teasing and circling his nerve-loaded entrance. He felt an increase in pressure and fluttered his eyes open to see Cas’ dark blue eyes boring into him. His mouth dropped open when Cas’ slicked finger pressed inside, the angel matching the sinful action by slipping his tongue past Dean’s lips.

For several moments, Dean let himself be fucked open by fingers and that incredibly talented tongue. His jaw hung open, his legs splayed out to the side, his wrists still restrained above him. 

Waves of sensation roared through his veins, taking him higher with each touch. He drifted out of time and space, reduced to nothing but how he felt being taken apart. The only thing that pulled him back was when Cas pecked his lips and nuzzled against his cheek, kissing gently towards the shell of his ear. 

“I’m going to make you come like before… using my grace. Don’t fight it… I know it’s intense.”

Dean immediately tried to brace for it. Having Cas grace-fuck him to orgasm was like getting slammed by a tractor-trailer of ecstasy. And then having each and every one of those pills explode inside him like fireworks.  

“Don’t fight it, Dean,” Cas reminded him, using two fingers to curl into Dean. The tiniest spikes of pleasure started to flare and burst everywhere Cas touched him, growing in intensity. It was worse between his legs, his cock throbbed and ached. His ass tightened and clenched around Cas’ twisting digits and he knew he was starting to whimper and plead. 

It took everything he had to let the grace work through him, to give in to such a heightened unnatural level of arousal… likely pushing the spectrum of what the human body could handle before it fucking exploded into orgasmic shrapnel. It had the power to strip his mind of all thought, make every muscle hard as steel.

He screamed when he finally came, the feeling so piercing and raw a few tears squeezed out from the corners of his eyes. He convulsed as warm jets of come splashed across his torso. Every spasm of his body steeped in pleasure, leaving him moaning and laughing simultaneously. 

No doubt he was coming off as hysterical. But, really, who the fuck cared anymore.  

Cause _damn_ , this was the best fucking thing he’d ever felt. And the craziest part? Cas was  _ nowhere  _ near done with him. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mm, hope you liked that little porn teaser. I also wanted to apologize for being so OFF my schedule and I wanted to explain. 
> 
> DCBB has been a huge distraction, which most of you know. BUTTTTT..... 
> 
> I am also pregnant. Yes, I am growing a human and FUCKING hell i am exhausted like all the time and my brain is like a bowl of cheerios that's been sitting in milk for like an hour. Hence, why I've been struggling more than normal, so please bear with me. 
> 
> I love you all! Thanks for continuing to read xoxoxox


	26. **Not a Chapter**

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An update.

Hello to my dear readers. I am sorry this is not a chapter but I wanted to give you all an update since I've been MIA for months. Firstly, I had a baby and it turned out to be more demanding than I anticipated, especially because the little one wasn't sleeping well and I was still doing some office work so my time was swallowed up pretty thoroughly. And I was fucking exhausted and my brain has been mush. 

On top of all that, a friend of mine died, and then my father became ill and also passed away very recently. And then my gramma was in the hospital and I still need to take care of my fathers affairs. 

So basically it has been the summer from hell. I am so emotionally drained and tired and I need a little bit of time to grieve and recuperate. Thankfully, it seems like things are starting to get better... well not BETTER, because of what I've lost but there is less chaos. My little one seems to be sleeping better and I'm hoping I can sneak a little more "me" time into the day. 

I do plan on finishing this fic, and hopefully start to write new stuff one day soon but for now, please bear with me. It has been a very difficult, dark time. 

Thank you so much for supporting my writing. I love you all and I love this fandom and I miss you guys and this community and my friends so much.

xoxoxo. 

**Author's Note:**

> Since this is a WIP, please let me know if you like it or where its going because I can always adjust as I go depending on what everyone thinks.


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